Brain Interfaces – Fiction becoming fact.

A brain implant which restores vision by stimulating the cortex directly, entirely bypassing lens, retina and optic nerve!

http://www.massdevice.com/second-sight-reveals-1st-implant-orion-visual-cortical-stimulator/

This is basically the tech used by Spex in my Singularity’s Children books.

So Long and Thanks for All The Fish

Dolphins talk to each other in complete sentences.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/09/11/dolphins-recorded-having-a-conversation-for-first-time/

One of the key ‘Science Fiction’ themes in my Singularity’s Children series, is that animals are much smarter than we generally assume. 
Teach a parrot to talk and it has surprisingly clever things to say. 
It seems unfair that an animal has to first learn our language before sitting its IQ test.
I am convinced that animals will sound smarter in their own languages, just as my kids tell me I come across as a dimwit when I speak in German.