A neuroscience researcher responds to Jonathan Parks-Ramage's "The Preschool." There's a famous saying, often credited to Isaac Asimov, that "today's science fiction is tomorrow's science fact." Whoever said it, they weren't wrong. The Dick Tracy two-way wrist radio is now commonplace, the Jetsons' videophone is ubiquitous (and more compact), and stun guns are often carried by police officers--although they never say "Set your phasers on stun." Today's science fiction is chock-full of ideas that are not yet fully realized, such as interstellar exploration, time travel, alien communication, teleportation, and cybernetics.

Robotics is a smoking-hot industry that's evolving by literal leaps and bounds, and the top researchers in the field are also some of sci-fi's geekiest fans. Robin Murphy, the Raytheon professor of computer science and engineering at Texas A&M University, specializes in artificial intelligence for robotics. As a component of her curriculum, she writes "Science Fiction, Science Fact," a series of provocative, engaging articles that highlight the myriad differences between the robots and droids depicted in popular science fiction films and the best sci-fi TV shows and actual robots and autonomous machines working in the real world. Although "The Mandalorian" and "The Book of Boba Fett" excel in depicting visually arresting Star Wars droids, their mechanical designs are not only impractical but often no match for real robots, Murphy explained in a column in the journal Science Robotics (opens in new tab). In addition to being one of the finest minds in robotics, she's the distinguished author of several MIT Press books on the topic, including "Robotics Through Science Fiction (opens in new tab)" (2018), "Introduction to AI Robotics (opens in new tab)" (2001, 2018) and "Disaster Robotics (opens in new tab)" (2014).

Thanks to science fiction movies and literature, many people are already familiar with the idea of virtual worlds One only needs to think of various popular films and books to imagine how people might navigate a different reality via an avatar. Increasingly, however, companies want to turn fiction into reality, with Facebook (now known as Meta) just one example of a brand leading the charge, evolving from a pure social media platform into a tech company pushing for an entirely virtual universe known as the metaverse. But what exactly is the metaverse? What opportunities does it offer for everyday life?

Technology innovation continues to restructure industries and redefine what’s possible – but how is it reshaping the experiences we want from our interaction with organisations? The future medical industry will see machines diagnose us, while humans hold our hands.  A reality, definitely and less scary than you might first think. Think of a super smart computer – or Artificial Intelligence –  that could instantly mine every piece of relevant medical research available on the planet relating to your symptoms to make a diagnosis and recommend treatment. Not just based on the intellect of your consultant, but that of every consultant and

The idea of artificial intelligence (AI) has been around for millennia. Stories of AI are scattered throughout history and across the globe: Hephaestus, of Greek mythology, "created" golden robots; Yan Shi (1023–957 BC, Zhou Dynasty) "built" a mechanical man; Leonardo Da Vinci constructed a Robotic Knight. What was once a dream or some crazy figment of one's imagination, has since become an evolving reality. Aristotle (384–322 BC) came up with what we could arguably call a simple notion: syllogism. At the core, it relies on logic and reasoning to deduce a conclusion.

While only a handful of researchers currently have the experience and skills to work on machine learning, it is imperative that the general public understand the role AI will play in our society and learn to adapt with it. Economists argue on exact figures of unemployment, but there is no doubt that AI will alter, if not eliminate, most unskilled labor jobs. There is not enough mainstream media coverage depicting this, leaving far too many people in the dark. The "Today" show should bring in computer scientists and engineers to discuss AI instead of a fashion designer to cover an awards show.

Artificial intelligence is quickly growing in importance in the'smart building' sector. Paul Skelton looks at the road ahead for a complex technology. When Mark Chung received an unexpectedly high $500 monthly electricity bill, he turned to his utility for help and answers. However, despite'smart' meters being installed in his home, they were no help. So Mark – an electrical engineer trained at Stanford University – took matters into his own hands.

I got into sci-fi when I was a young teenager. That's when I really started pouring on the steam as a competitive swimmer and a member of a barbershop quartet, which meant I had a lot of free time to read all the way through high school while other young men were spending all those tedious hours exchanging bodily fluids and viruses with young women (or each other). I was filling my head with possible futures, then thinking about them (or singing the baritone parts to one-hundred-year-old songs) for six hours a day in the pool. I never grew taller than 5-foot-6, which ruined my chances of becoming a world-class swimmer, and I never was able to grow a handlebar moustache, which ruined my chances of becoming a professional barbershop quartet singer. I was super into gear, and dreamed of possessing impossible inventions, like I was Miniver Cheevy longing for the Medici gold.

Knowledge sharing website Science Alert has compiled a list of 23 science facts that we didn't know at the start of 2016. The new findings related to knowledge management include that it's possible to live a normal life without 90 percent of your brain, and that for the first time, artificial intelligence beat a human champion in the highly complex game of Go. The debate that is emerging around another of the 23 facts – NASA's peer-reviewed finding that the "impossible" EM drive produces thrust – highlights the complexities that exist in science and how self-correction in science benefits scientific rigour and integrity1. Yet another of the 23 facts highlights how attitudes and opinions can negatively influence the management of knowledge. In the 1920s, a museum director dismissed some of Leonardo da Vinci's scribbled notes and diagrams as being irrelevant. However, a University of Cambridge professor has found that a page of these scribbles from 1493 actually contains the first written records demonstrating the laws of friction.

One of the wonderful things about living in the digital age is getting to experience the rapidity at which science fiction seems to become science fact. No, we still don't have those flying cars promised back in the 1950's, but we do have self-driving ones. Virtual reality is a thing. And not only is most everything touch screen nowadays, but we can interact with holograms as well. While chatbots may not seem as science fiction as the rest the aforementioned technologies, the advances that companies are making in the A.I. that powers them is just that.