J. David Archibald is professor emeritus of biology at San Diego State University and curator of mammals at the San Diego State University Museum of Biodiversity. His books include Dinosaur Extinction and the End of an Era: What the Fossils Say (1996) and Aristotle's Ladder, Darwin's Tree: The Evolution of Visual Metaphors for Biological Order (2014), both from Columbia University Press, as well as Charles Darwin: A Reference Guide to His Life and Works (2018).