What If The World Spoke One Language

[arnz 0]

My apologies for dragging religious into this, but according to a few of em... they were speaking the same language before it was changed to different languages to prevent them from building a "great pyramid" of some sort.Ok, out of that, I'd have to say variety is one of the functions that keep the earth functioning.. if its the same language, they may be many benefits from doing so, but would increase boredom out of speaking the same language (Another example is if accents were changed from many to the one and the same, it'll also yield out the same result, boring.. as many different accents can be interesting).

[Matrixdudej 0]

well,many people have jobs as translators and they would be out of luck if everyone in the world spoke the same language,however it also has benefits,no confusion and also there would no longer be a need for a translator however, some languages are harder to learn than others,yes it would be beneficial but also non beneficial,however unless they make a machine that teaches you a language really fast in the distant future i dont think it will ever happen lol

[GuardiansofGlory 0]

It would be easy talk to other people because we would all know one language. So if your on a vacation you do not have to learn a new language. This will never happen because there are so many languages in the world and the only different language you can speak other than the chosen language is secret code. Instead of making a secret code you can use the language you known before the one language was chosen. If the chosen language is a language you don't know yet then it might be hard to learn it or it might not depending on who you are and this is what i think if the world only spoke a chosen language.

[arnz 0]

The diversity, and the challenge of learning new things such as languages would also pretty much be lost had the world adopted the one language! But still, I have to agree while it may be easier if it was one, it'll be boring and in some cases maybe repetitive.

[Erin 0]

I think it would be cool to be able to speak to someone living in, like, China and not have a huge barrier like different languages... but I also think it would be horrible since, as others have said, having so many differences is very beautiful. I love the beauty of other cultures and languages so to lose any of that would be horrible.

Edited December 28, 2006 by Erin (see edit history)

[hydrogen 0]

Someone already tried making one international language and coined it Esperanto.
It was created by L.L Zamenhof whose goal was to:

create an easy and flexible language as a universal second language to foster peace and international understanding.

There's quite a few speakers and it borrows a lot from other languages and apparently if you learn Esperanto before learning another language you will be more adept at it.

Wikipedia has a great article on it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto

[richierich1m 0]

It would be really good if there would be only one language, a lot of learning languages problem would be solved but i don't support it because every language has its own culture own feel ,it is the diversity that makes this world beautiful you won't like every country look same than there would be no fun of travelling different parts of the world its fun to enjoy things as they are

[Hagar9999 0]

I think it'll happen - I think to an extent its happening already. English is becoming a pretty international language, and everyone in the commercial world recognizes the value of one common language. So yes, I think it'll come about eventually, but it'll be a gradual process, not all at once.

[iGuest 3]

I think the world will not be better off with only one language, without language barrier, misunderstanding and conflicts still exist,but much more we will lose,can french still be so romantic if they don't speak french anymore?can german still be so precise if they don't speak german? language is a crucial part of culture,without various languages,we lose the diversity of culture~-sofia

[Wanhoop 0]

I think it would be very handy.Specially when you travel alot.

[teknoTom 0]

I know these are purely hypothetical ideas, but its comparable to saying 'What if there were no countries! There would be no wars!' statement.

[faund 0]

Different languages do not only imply different countries, states, or regions. Different languages represent different cultural in the world. Cultural in each counties ,states ,and refions is unigue. It is hard to express one definition in a certain culture.For example : there is so many idiom ,saying , literary works in china. They are so obsure. But they are attractive.Because they are from different cultural. They are in different languages.There are so many stories in these idiom and so on.One chinese character contain a long story. I believe other countries are same.In china there is a form of art ,called calligraphy. So many people love it.If everyone speaks one langue we will lose so much. we will have no various culture, like no four seasons in the earth ,like full moon every day,like having one follow smell in the world ,like ........So it is impossible the whole world speake one language. I don't hope that.

[Liam_CF 0]

This would take out some of the cultural diversity on this planet and make each seperate place less unique. I'm not saying that it would not have it's advantages but I'm not really for this idea.

[midnightvamp 1]

I couldn't really see the entire world with just one language. I could see the world all knowing a language, but everyone also still holding onto the languages that have been around for so many years, because I feel like it would be a shame to lose something that historic, just to make it a little easier on people so that they don't have to learn another language.I actually find it fun to learn other languages (call me a geek if you so desire... but small things bring me much pleasure, and understanding what someone is saying when they are talking in another language than the English that I grew up with is an amazing thing to me.) and I do so regularly, trying to improve on my pronunciation and vocabulary in the language that I'm currently working on.My current task - Japanese. It's so different from English, and presents quite a challenge, but it's a welcomed challenge, and I love the sense of accomplishment that I get when I learn more and more of that language. In fact, there was even a time today that I got to feel pretty good, when my sister said to me... this is so cute, but I have no idea what they are saying, or even what language it is in!So I went over there, and low and behold, they were speaking in Japanese... so I told her that and translated the parts of it that I could (which wasn't the entire thing, but it still was much better than nothing... and we had a fun time as she continued on with it, since she had a bit better understanding of what was going on. I love when moments like this arise, when I can be of some help to people because I've taken the time to learn something new... even though it was more for fun on my part.Anyway, if there was no other languages out there to learn, I'd be missing a bit part of what I enjoy to do, so I really don't hope that it happens where all of the world only speaks one language.Sure, I'd love for the world to be able to talk to each other in a certain language, so that it would make conversing much easier for everyone, but I would also love people to preserve the language and culture that they've been born with so as not to let any more languages become 'dead languages', because I feel it's a shame for that to happen, because once it's gone, it hard or impossible to bring back that knowledge (especially for the certain languages among natives or tribes in the different countries where there is already such a small amount of people that can speak the language.)

[A200 0]

Ultimately its impossible to speak just one language, after a while a group of people is bound to speak it a little differently then it ends up being a totally new language..This is what happened to Latin. RIP universal language.

Edited November 20, 2007 by A200 (see edit history)