00:01Well look, it was so exciting not just for me but for all of our staff and our supporters
00:07and also the young people from different schools who'd come in to meet him.
00:12And it was really seeing him interact with the kids that was really exciting.
00:18It was wonderful for them to experience somebody of Sir David's stature but also his beautiful
00:24approach to them, very grandfatherly in that approach.
00:28But he was thrilled to be at the museum because we of course not only made him our lifetime
00:33patron that day but we named a semi-slug after him.
00:37Two of our scientists discovered this very interesting little slug that only partially
00:45retracted into its shell and it was named Attenborough Arian Rubicundus in his honour.
00:53So museums are really exciting and Sir David commented to me that day that he visited us
00:59that the Australian Museum was so important because it had been charged with identifying
01:04all of the species found on this relatively newly occupied continent.
01:10And I mean that by white people of course, not by our First Nations people.
01:13And that it was our job to quantify and systematically identify all of those species here in Australia.
01:22And that's an incredibly important responsibility because museums tell that story of the past.
01:28But importantly, because of the scientific collections, we can also tell the story of the future and look to the
01:35future.
01:35We can look at the impacts of climate change, for example, on our country because of the species included in
01:44our collections.
01:45I think the most important part of Sir David's work was making the natural world accessible to us all.
01:52And being that trusted voice, just like museums are trusted institutions, Sir David has epitomised trust in science.
02:00And that incredible mellifluous tone that he has as he's taken us to remote parts of the world.
02:07He's given us that opportunity to experience the world, but see it through new eyes, not through the eyes of
02:13a tourist,
02:14but through the eyes of someone who understands the interactions between nature and species and the natural environment and humans.
02:24I mean, humans, unfortunately, are the ones who are impacting this planet.
02:29We're living in the age of the Anthropocene now.
02:32And who better to explain that to us and to urge us to take some positive action for the environment,
02:39to respect the natural environment, who better than Sir David Attenborough?
02:42So he has occupied that space for all of my lifetimes.
02:46His success in relating to young people as well, to see young faces light up when they met Sir David
02:54or when they come into a museum and discover things for the first time.
02:58I think it's curiosity that keeps us all going and that engagement.
03:03So I think we can all take a leaf out of Sir David's book today.
03:06He's obviously got good genes himself, but to live this long, but to continue to be able to be passionate
03:14about the cause that he represents is extraordinary.
03:18We are so lucky to have had him in our lives.
03:21I'm working in Texas.
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