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Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. I think having English as a native language actually gives us a huge advantage: we can trav

Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. I think having English as a native language actually gives us a huge advantage: we can travel to a large chunk of the world and have a pretty good chance of being understood. We can work in globally relevant jobs with no language barrier. And so on.

olah_1 6y ago
> Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. A lack of incentive is what stops most. > we can travel to a large chunk of the world and have a pretty good chance of being understood. We can work in globally relevant jobs with no language barrier. And so on. You described the benefit of knowing English, not being a native English speaker.
- Viliam1234 6y ago
  The advantage of being a native English speaker is that you do not have to waste years of your life learning English as a second language. You could spend the same amount of time learning a different language... but you probably can find a better use for that time. In the time I spent learning English -- which is still far from perfect, especially in spoken form -- I probably could have learned quantum physics instead. Except, I realistically couldn't have, because good textbooks on this topic do not exist in my language, I wouldn't be able to learn more online, etc. Now imagine removing an equivalent amount of knowledge from your life -- that is the price you would have to pay for not being a native English speaker. (The idea of Esperanto as everyone's second language is that instead of some people spending 10+ years learning the common language, and some lucky people spending 0, everyone would spend 2 years instead. Until people would hopefully realize that private languages are useless, and then it would be 0 for everyone.)
__sisyphus__ 6y ago
> Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. You're right, nothing is stopping one from learning a second language; unfortunately not only do most english speakers lack incentive, but also they lack the ability to practice in the way most other languages do. Most of the time when you run into non-native english speakers, they would rather practice their english with you, even when in their country of origin. Additionally, there's very little lingual diversity in the US as it stands. Sure, there are plenty of spanish speakers, but early education doesn't really focus on teaching spanish with any sort of fluency as a true end-goal. So situationally it just makes learning a second language that much more difficult. Nonetheless, I do agree with you that there are obviously huge benefits to it; the few that you mention, along with many others.

olah_1 6y ago

> Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. A lack of incentive is what stops most. > we can travel to a large chunk of the world and have a pretty good chance of being understood. We can work in globally relevant jobs with no language barrier. And so on. You described the benefit of knowing English, not being a native English speaker.

Viliam1234 6y ago
The advantage of being a native English speaker is that you do not have to waste years of your life learning English as a second language. You could spend the same amount of time learning a different language... but you probably can find a better use for that time. In the time I spent learning English -- which is still far from perfect, especially in spoken form -- I probably could have learned quantum physics instead. Except, I realistically couldn't have, because good textbooks on this topic do not exist in my language, I wouldn't be able to learn more online, etc. Now imagine removing an equivalent amount of knowledge from your life -- that is the price you would have to pay for not being a native English speaker. (The idea of Esperanto as everyone's second language is that instead of some people spending 10+ years learning the common language, and some lucky people spending 0, everyone would spend 2 years instead. Until people would hopefully realize that private languages are useless, and then it would be 0 for everyone.)

__sisyphus__ 6y ago

> Nothings stops you from learning whatever second language you want. You're right, nothing is stopping one from learning a second language; unfortunately not only do most english speakers lack incentive, but also they lack the ability to practice in the way most other languages do. Most of the time when you run into non-native english speakers, they would rather practice their english with you, even when in their country of origin. Additionally, there's very little lingual diversity in the US as it stands. Sure, there are plenty of spanish speakers, but early education doesn't really focus on teaching spanish with any sort of fluency as a true end-goal. So situationally it just makes learning a second language that much more difficult. Nonetheless, I do agree with you that there are obviously huge benefits to it; the few that you mention, along with many others.