ThinkPiece: Embracing Love as an Educational Force in the Anthropocene

Abstract

In the past decade, an increasing number of geologists and other scientific researchers have presented evidence that we have entered a new geologic epoch called the Anthropocene. The primary characteristic of the Anthropocene, researchers argue, revolves around the combination of an emerging and measurable sedimentary layer of increasing human artifacts (mostly plastics) in combination with significant and negative transformations within the Earth’s biodiversity and climate systems. In this article, the researchers were interested in exploring how anthropogenic events will likely affect educational systems and institutions through multi-decade environmental audits and educational planning that are more closely linked to addressing the world’s major anthropogenic problems such as climate change and a global loss of biodiversity related to human development and activity. This article concludes by exploring how anthropogenic forces might be redirected as human catalysts for a more positive environmental and geologic legacy.

Keywords: Anthropocene, anthropogenic force, environmental education, educational catalysts, emotion