The mother elephant waves her trunk with annoyance. The herd is about to set off across the savannahA large flat area covered with glass and occasional trees. for the next waterhole, but her son is nowhere to be seen. Typical! Why must he keep wandering off on his own? All she can do is call his name: "Kala Nag!"

This is an imagined scenario. But according to a new study from ColoradoA state in the west of the US that contains much of the Rocky Mountains. State University,¹ it may not be far from reality.

Researchers used AIA computer programme that has been designed to think.  to analyse over 400 calls between individual elephants in KenyaA country in East Africa with a population of nearly 54 million people. . These ranged from loud trumpeting to rumbles too low for humans to hear. These rumbles travel as seismicOf enormous size or effect. waves through the ground and can reach elephants 6km away.

The AI algorithmAny set of rules followed by a computer. In the context of social media, "the algorithm" refers to the intelligent AI that learns the interests of the user and presents them with posts that it thinks will interest them. picked out sounds that could have been names. The scientists then played these back to the elephants they believed they belonged to.

They wanted to see whether the elephants would react - and they did, "energetically".² When the names of other elephants were played to them, there was no reaction.

No other creatures apart from humans are known to address each other by name. A few species, such as parrots and bottlenose dolphins, use vocal signals in a similar way, but there is a crucial difference: they transmit a name referring to themselves rather than the creature they are talking to. 

The discovery has far-reaching implications. If elephants are intelligent enough to learn each other's names, they may be able to think in a similar way to us.

Four years ago a champion of animal rights, Steven Wise, brought a court case against Bronx Zoo in New York. He argued that an elephant called Happy was being unlawfully detained there and should be moved to a sanctuary.

He referred to the law of habeas corpus. This ensures that a person in prison must be brought before a court to decide whether their imprisonment is legal. If he won, it would mean that Happy was a person in the eyes of the law - and therefore had rights.

Wise lost. But the judge conceded that Happy was "an intelligent, autonomousHaving the freedom to control itself or its life. being who should be treated with respect and dignity, and who may be entitled to liberty."³

And public opinion is moving in favour of animals: a poll by GallupAn American analytics company. found that a third of Americans believed they should have the same rights as humans.

Should they have human rights?

Yes: Elephants are very close to us. They have huge brains and impressive memories, and have been found to show grief, compassion and empathyThe capacity to understand and feel the suffering of others.. The new discovery shows that they even think like us.

No: There has to be something which distinguishes humans from other creatures. If they were given our rights, other animals would follow, and the whole food industry would be in jeopardyDanger..

Or... Animals already have enough rights - almost as many as children. They are protected by law from mistreatment by humans, and they can even be left money in a person's will.