Thanks for this wonderful award for outreach in paleobiology. I love what I do for a living: research (Figure 1), teaching, outreach, and editing. Some days I do more teaching, other days more research, and others more editing. It is a good mix for me. Every day, I feel like a little boy thinking, “Oh my God, what am I going to discover today? And what will I be able to share with others?” So, to me, work is fun. Indeed, some days, my colleagues and I have made spectacular discoveries that I eventually get to share with others.
Figure 1. The author in southeastern Puerto Rico. Credit: Courtesy of an anonymous photographer who generously permitted the use of this image for professional purposes.
I firmly believe that everyone who wants to learn deserves to be educated. I ask my colleagues, “How many people read our technical papers? In contrast, how much greater impact on science literacy can we have when we communicate our discoveries to the public in plain language and with enthusiasm?” After all, let us remember, many of us are paid with taxpayer funds, and the taxpayers deserve the best of science in plain language. As for me, I find outreach and formal teaching to be fun. It is all about learning—and helping people be happy.
Acknowledgments
Submitted on August 26, 2025. These remarks are an almost verbatim transcription of the author’s video presentation delivered at the 2024 Annual Meeting of the Paleontological Society, held in conjunction with the Geological Society of America Annual Meeting in Anaheim, California, USA, September 22–25, 2024. The author is especially grateful to the videographer, who, as a personal favor, generously devoted time and expertise to producing the recording and has chosen to remain anonymous. The author also acknowledges S. Shaffer for converting the captioned text from the video into a transcript, which was subsequently formatted into a Word document and lightly edited with the assistance of ChatGPT.
