However, Rowlands suffered a reaction to the magnet and had to remove it. This is a relatively common risk with implants, and they need to be coated with some kind of biocompatible material to avoid being expelled by the body. However, even these coatings can cause a reaction, as Rowlands discovered. He’s currently searching for a more tissue-friendly alternative.

Gaining an animal ability does not have to mean relying on technology. Daniel Kish lost his sight at the age of 13 months after suffering retinal blastoma, a form of cancer that affects the eyes. Within two months, his parents noticed he seemed to be able to navigate his environment and had a sense of what was around him. “Echolocation is something I’ve done for as long as I can remember,” he says. “The clicking of echolocation is used discreetly and strategically, so it isn’t something that would necessarily be immediately obvious to my parents.”

Bat man

Quite on his own, Kish had learned to visualise the environment by clicking his tongue and listening to the reflected sounds. Echolocation is used by bats as well as cetaceans such as dolphins and whales to sense their environment. Kish identifies at least two kinds of echolocation he uses – the active clicking which he calls “flash sonar” (in reference to the illuminating flash of a camera), and passive echolocation which relies on paying careful attention to the acoustics of the immediate environment. Together, they form a small subset of the skills he uses to compensate for his lack of sight.

“There’s a misconception out there that you have to be gifted to develop this skill,” he says. “I would say that’s not true. You get ranges of ability, but it really has most to do with the motivation one has and the opportunity to implement the skill.”

Indeed, others are already following Kish, such as Sam Oldridge, a British boy who was echolocating by the time he was eight years old (see video, below). And as president of World Access for the Blind, Kish runs workshops to teach blind students how to echolocate as well receive proper cane training.