Developing Lyell’s Legacy: Contributions to the Geosciences of the Anthropocene

In this new edition of the Geoscience of the Built Environment [1], we hope to continue our contribution to the development of Geosciences studies in the Anthropocene, considering classical issues that are at least as old as Charles Lyell’s major works [2,3], which can be considered the founding literary works of modern Geology. The Anthropocene is currently being discussed as a possible Unit in the Geological Time Scale [4], and its definition is still a controversial issue [5]. It has also been proposed that the Anthropocene marks the end of “a time of great epistemic stability” [6] and that new approaches and ways of thinking will be necessary [6,7]; a question that is also implicitly considered in a forthcoming issue of this journal [8]. The Geosciences of the future (as is discussed in the proposal of [8]), done in the Anthropocene, will have to go beyond the geological record and embrace studies on the relations between humans and Earth, including the evolution of built objects due to geological processes. I will attempt to discuss some of the kinds of issues to be considered using the papers of this Special Issue and in the light of the major works of Lyell (attempting to show the links of these issues to the founding concepts of Geology). In the Principles of Geology [2], Charles Lyell presented Geology as “the science which investigates the successive changes that have taken place in the organic and inorganic kingdoms of nature; it inquiries into the causes of these changes, and the influence which they have exerted in modifying the surface and external structure of our planet”. In the Manual of Elementary Geology [3], Lyell justifies the concern of Geology with the superficial portions of the planet (crust) given that “although the dimensions of such a crust are, in truth, insignificant when compared to the entire globe, yet they are vast, and of magnificent extent in relation to man, and to the organic beings which people our globe” (the highlight of the relevance to humans is clear). Lyell presents in [3] several examples of how to relate terrain features to geological structures. Lyell also considered, in [2], diverse examples of the effects of geologic phenomena on human structures (such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and geomorphological processes) but also examples of how human action can affect geological processes. In a case that illustrates how human actions could influence natural processes which might affect human structures and activities, Lyell refers [2] to a certain rock terrain that was “quarried for lime to such an extent that the sea broke through, and in 1795 carried away the whole village in one night, and penetrated 150 yards inland, where it has maintained its ground ever since, the new village having been built farther inland on the new shore”. The paper by Theilen-Willige and collaborators [9] uses several modern techniques to “read” features from the terrain in relation to the possible impact of human structures on seismicity (which might have impacts on other human structures). The paper by Perez-Monserrat and collaborators [10] can be considered a variant of this perspective, studying processes that affect geologic materials in human structures and that include the effects of other human activities.