The Beginning of a New Era
To describe the history of Earth, scientists have labeled major geologic periods and called them eons. The present eon is called the Phanerozoic, which is divided into three eras: the Paleozoic era, from 570 to 245 million years ago; the Mesozoic era, from 245 to 67 million years ago; and the Cenozoic era, from 67 million years ago to present.
Unique biological and geological creativity characterized each of these eras. During each era, life forms unfolded through the process of genetic mutation, natural selection and global climatic changes.
Global climatic weather changes brought mass extinction to the predominant species, and caused each of these eras to end abruptly. The now extinct placoderms (the first jawed fish) were the dominant species during the Paleozoic era. The dinosaurs were the dominant species during the Mesozoic era.
The Cenozoic era was a time of extreme creativity and growth on Earth, during which continents drifted into each other, forming mountain ranges. Flowers, plants, and mammals began to take on their current forms. Many new species came into existence, such as the whales, primates, horses, cattle, dolphins, elephants and rodents. During the Cenozoic era all life on the planet followed Earth’s natural process.
A species relatively new to planet Earth, human beings, is having an unprecedented impact on evolution. Human beings are altering the very conditions – genetic mutation, natural selection, and global climate patterns – that, in the past, have been responsible for
massive species extinction.
Humans are experimenting with genetic mutation through the science of biotechnology. Humans are interfering with Earth’s process of natural selection by dooming many species of plants and animals to extinction yearly by destroying their habitats. Our industrial/technological society is even disrupting global climatic weather patterns.
In the last hundred years the human species has dramatically altered what has taken Earth millions of years of evolution to create. We have evolved into a species with extreme power to affect the natural world.
As a species, we have two distinct paths to choose from. One choice is to continue on our present destructive path in which we use the natural world for our own shortterm benefit. We could call this the Technozoic Era. This might be a dead end road for many life forms on planet Earth, including humans.
The other choice is to function with an ecological awareness of the entire Earth communities’ best interests. We could call this an Ecozoic era. In this era, human priorities would be congruent with the priorities of the rest of the natural world. An Ecozoic person would live with the value that all life forms are interdependent with every other.
In an Ecozoic era, people would hold the planet’s best interests in their hearts and act on them. An example of such an action would be to eat more Earthfriendly, organic, plantbased foods.
Humans have a distinctive role in the evolutionary process of this planet. Maybe it’s time for the humans to grow up, take less and contribute more to the Earth community.
“The Universe Story”, written by Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry, inspired the concept of this synopsis.