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I have many times wondered if the world would be a better place if we could unify our world to use a common language. What horrifies me would be the horrendous

I have many times wondered if the world would be a better place if we could unify our world to use a common language. What horrifies me would be the horrendous loss of cultures that we will loose access to.

tnzn 8y ago
I doubt the world would be a better place. Different languages often go hand in hand with different cultures, trying to unify everything may not be a good idea to make the world better.
- mmjaa 8y ago
  I believe the answer is that we must teach our children to be multi-lingual, at all costs, and eschew any and all cultures which, on the basis of the value they place on their own language, render other cultures words 'inferior'. The spirit of the desire to render a world language is a good one. There are many ways this can be accomplished; at a personal level, it is made through the decision to honour every word, every symbol, every sign on Earth, with equality.
  - ardent_uno 8y ago
    If your real goal is "unity and equality", then everyone should learn one language. Then, because different languages often foster different cultures, we will eliminate significant differences in culture which are so often the source of human conflict. One of the greatest gifts any superpower bequeaths to the world is a de facto universal language, such as Latin in Roman times. America being so dominant economically and culturally has given English to the world, which has reached a level of popular ubiquity unlike the world has ever known. This is a very good thing for the world.
  - artificial 8y ago
    Guess French is out :/
fallingfrog 8y ago
You'd better start learning Chinese then!
- Cretin2 8y ago
  Which 'Chinese'?
- adventured 8y ago
  There are more English speakers globally than there are Mandarin speakers. The number of people that can comprehend some reasonable amount of English is even higher. The Mandarin number is going to contract as China's population declines, the English speaking population will continue to expand perpetually. By comparison, half of the EU can speak English, and that figure is climbing. Less than 1% of the EU can speak Mandarin. The same premise holds for Africa and Latin America. In Latin America, Mandarin is such a rarely known language it's difficult to even measure its use against Spanish, Portuguese and English. Few people in the rest of the world are attempting to learn Mandarin, because it's a very difficult language to learn and it has a limited cultural projection. The use case to learn Mandarin is primarily restricted to a subset of a subset of business. More people speak English in Asia outside of China, than speak Mandarin.
- mitchty 8y ago
  I'd highly encourage you to listen to this lexicon valley podcast, I am a bit skeptical on mandarin or cantonese or one of the other dialects of chinese taking over globally. http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2018/05/john_mcwhorter_on_the_prospect_of_a_universal_language.html http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2018/0...
- paidleaf 8y ago
  There is no such thing as a "chinese" language. Your statement is akin to saying "You'd better start learning european then". China is a region with a far greater linguistic diversity than europe.
  - laretluval 8y ago
DoofusOfDeath 8y ago
Reminds me of a quip from Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw: "The United States and Great Britain are two countries separated by a common language."
Viliam1234 8y ago
I like the idea of everyone using Esperanto as their second language. But there is a problem with incentives. Even the argument of political neutrality has its problems: someone has to be the first to seriously support the language, but at that moment the language would stop being perceived as neutral. (For example, if tomorrow EU would decide to use Esperanto as a neutral common language, and if the plan would actually work well, then people outside EU would see it as the language of EU, not as a neutral one.) Also, sometimes people don't want to cooperate, but rather to out-compete their neighbors. Learning English or Chinese is more difficult than learning an artificial language -- but if you have already paid the costs of learning them, you have an advantage over your neighbors who got worse education. Making international communication too simple would take away the relative advantage of those who have already invested in the current one.

tnzn 8y ago

I doubt the world would be a better place. Different languages often go hand in hand with different cultures, trying to unify everything may not be a good idea to make the world better.

mmjaa 8y ago
I believe the answer is that we must teach our children to be multi-lingual, at all costs, and eschew any and all cultures which, on the basis of the value they place on their own language, render other cultures words 'inferior'. The spirit of the desire to render a world language is a good one. There are many ways this can be accomplished; at a personal level, it is made through the decision to honour every word, every symbol, every sign on Earth, with equality.
- ardent_uno 8y ago
  If your real goal is "unity and equality", then everyone should learn one language. Then, because different languages often foster different cultures, we will eliminate significant differences in culture which are so often the source of human conflict. One of the greatest gifts any superpower bequeaths to the world is a de facto universal language, such as Latin in Roman times. America being so dominant economically and culturally has given English to the world, which has reached a level of popular ubiquity unlike the world has ever known. This is a very good thing for the world.
- artificial 8y ago
  Guess French is out :/

fallingfrog 8y ago

You'd better start learning Chinese then!

Cretin2 8y ago
Which 'Chinese'?
adventured 8y ago
There are more English speakers globally than there are Mandarin speakers. The number of people that can comprehend some reasonable amount of English is even higher. The Mandarin number is going to contract as China's population declines, the English speaking population will continue to expand perpetually. By comparison, half of the EU can speak English, and that figure is climbing. Less than 1% of the EU can speak Mandarin. The same premise holds for Africa and Latin America. In Latin America, Mandarin is such a rarely known language it's difficult to even measure its use against Spanish, Portuguese and English. Few people in the rest of the world are attempting to learn Mandarin, because it's a very difficult language to learn and it has a limited cultural projection. The use case to learn Mandarin is primarily restricted to a subset of a subset of business. More people speak English in Asia outside of China, than speak Mandarin.
mitchty 8y ago
I'd highly encourage you to listen to this lexicon valley podcast, I am a bit skeptical on mandarin or cantonese or one of the other dialects of chinese taking over globally. http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2018/05/john_mcwhorter_on_the_prospect_of_a_universal_language.html http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2018/0...
paidleaf 8y ago
There is no such thing as a "chinese" language. Your statement is akin to saying "You'd better start learning european then". China is a region with a far greater linguistic diversity than europe.
- laretluval 8y ago

DoofusOfDeath 8y ago

Reminds me of a quip from Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw: "The United States and Great Britain are two countries separated by a common language."

Viliam1234 8y ago

I like the idea of everyone using Esperanto as their second language. But there is a problem with incentives. Even the argument of political neutrality has its problems: someone has to be the first to seriously support the language, but at that moment the language would stop being perceived as neutral. (For example, if tomorrow EU would decide to use Esperanto as a neutral common language, and if the plan would actually work well, then people outside EU would see it as the language of EU, not as a neutral one.) Also, sometimes people don't want to cooperate, but rather to out-compete their neighbors. Learning English or Chinese is more difficult than learning an artificial language -- but if you have already paid the costs of learning them, you have an advantage over your neighbors who got worse education. Making international communication too simple would take away the relative advantage of those who have already invested in the current one.