9 Anthropocene Reinhold Leinfelder Assuming Responsibility for the Anthropocene: Challenges and Opportunities in Education Introduction The Anthropocene is a scientifc hypothesis based on the assumption that humanity has become a global Earth system factor in sectors such as water circulation, climate, biological productivity, biodiversity, geobiochemical cycles, sedimentation patterns, and overall use of lands and seas (Crutzen and Stoermer 2000; Crutzen 2002; Williams et al. 2011). If this hypothesis is correct, and all available data corroborate its correctness, it has a great range of implications. It is necessary to understand that the previous epoch, the Holocene, has defnitely come to an end and will not be reestablished ever. Our current social and economic systems, such as agriculture, permanent settlements, transport and trade infrastruc- tures, and the large-scale division of labor, all developed during the relatively stable environmental conditions of the Holocene. Now, however, we have managed, inadver- tently and unconsciously, to strain these same environmental conditions to their limits. Ethically, the Anthropocene emphasizes that all of us—from individuals to states to the United Nations—are collectively responsible for the future of the world. Conceiv- ably, the same force that previously wrought unintended changes could be used in a conscious and refected manner to create a world that is sustainable on a regional as well as global scale for many generations to come. As a conceptual framework, the Anthropocene could hence provide a solid basis for envisioning a sustainable human presence on Earth in which humans would no longer be “invaders” but rather partici- pants in shaping the natural environment. In the future, technology and culture could be integrated into nature—and thus the “unnatural” environment that surrounds us today would be transformed into a human-designed neo-natural environment that in- cludes culture and technology as an integral part of an interconnected system (Lein- felder et al. 2012). Assuming such responsibility, however, means that transforming nature into even more human-made environments must be based on scientifc knowledge and large-scale