Hello everyone! I am Susannah Marshall. I am a student at Old Dominion University where I am a Psychology Major about to enter my junior year.

Now, I’m going to talk about three things you probably know about me, and three things you probably don’t know about me.

               First, you likely know I am an artist. At one time it was a business for me. I paint in oils and acrylics.

               Second, I am a lifelong learner as evidenced by my current schooling.

               Third, I was in the Navy and I worked for the Defense Intelligence Systems Agency. I really enjoy working for the government and it is something I might do again in the future.

Now, for the things you don’t know about me.

               First, I am a huge nature fanatic, or I prefer to say I am tuned in with mother earth.

               Two, I believe that all creatures on this earth just want to be happy and live their lives out on this earth. I adamantly believe that they are all also sentient. They are worthy of having a good life. I have a habit of rescuing bugs from inside my house, daddy longlegs, spiders, even crickets.

               Third, I stay abreast of many current developments as it relates to our understanding of this magnificent earth and all of its inhabitants.

                              Recently I learned of a new research project done by CETI, led by Dr. David Gruber. He and his team of researchers have found a way to communicate with whales, enabled by artificial Intelligence and a newly discovered way to communicate with whales in the whale’s language. You see, the whales not only have the ability to communicate, it turns out they also have a phonetic type of alphabet, and they are extremely more intelligent than we ever gave them credit for. The threshold was crossed when they successfully decoded what the whales were saying, and this was done successfully through the use of advanced Artificial Intelligence. The whales talked to them and they answered back, in the whale’s language! This is groundbreaking to put it simply. You can access this information and the ongoing study by visiting the website CETI. I must say this knowledge brings me much joy and contentment to see that we are truly connected to our fellow inhabitants of planet earth, whether they walk on two legs or four, or swim through our oceans.

I took this class as a requirement, but I also took it because public speaking is so very important in this day and age, on many levels. Thank you for being my audience!!!