Poll: One world language?

[tkioz]

Lots of languages are dying off, you just need to like at the UK and the huge amounts of money they are spending to "save" languages like Gaelic and Welsh (?) to see that, but do you think we're moving towards a single one world language and would that be a good thing?

If so, which language should / will it be? Mandarin and Cantonese are both spoken by a lot of people, but then you've got English which is pretty much the de facto "lingua franca" (and isn't that a funny phrase when used in this context) of the business and digital world at the moment.

Or should we develop an artificial language like Esperanto (only you know better...)?

 

[Eumersian]

Tough to say. Pretty much every developed nation already teaches English (as far as I know). Then again, it isn't the simplest language. I'll just say English, because I'm lazy and selfish about my own language.

I don't believe that we should all forget our old languages though. They have a lot of history behind them. They remind us that we once all had something to do with whatever language it is, in my opinion. I for one would love to move to the Outer Hebrides for a few years to learn Scots Gaelic. I know it's a useless language for the most part, but it's what I'm interested in, so I'll do it.

 

[XJ-0461]

I doubt there'll be one world language for a while. Too many people would be saying stuff like "I ain't speaking French/German/Mandarin/Klingon/Italian" for the idea to take hold.

However, I could see how a singular language for the whole planet would be useful.

 

[GundamSentinel]

English is the most widely known language, so it makes sense for it to be the world language. It's not too difficult either, so that's okay.

 

[Dana22]

Imperial Gothic of course.

 

[sharpe95th]

Well English has the most words, so English. It'd be a shame to lose all those words to some bibbly bobbly made up talk that they speak in abroad-land.

 

[Calico93]

Realistically its going to be English, but I'd like to learn an African language
One world language sounds a bit boring, when I think of all the other languages it makes the world seem bigger and alot more interesting.
I don't think English will wipe out all other languages, just stay as a second one, as its used mostly, or first language to us brits, sucks only knowing one language.

 

[monkey_man]

english
i come from Holland, and if we would have killed joanne of arc , we would speak english anyway.
Dutch is a needlessly complicated language.

 

[Subzerowings]

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.
I think that should clear things up.

 

[Jackalb]

One language would suck, then you can't bug people by cursing them in another.

 

[tomtom94]

English is good as a first language but I sure as hell wouldn't want to learn it, people have enough trouble with the apostrophe rule as it is!

We need to use a simple, easy to understand language with simple patterns, no matter what it is...

 

[tkioz]

Tough to say. Pretty much every developed nation already teaches English (as far as I know). Then again, it isn't the simplest language. I'll just say English, because I'm lazy and selfish about my own language.

I don't believe that we should all forget our old languages though. They have a lot of history behind them. They remind us that we once all had something to do with whatever language it is, in my opinion. I for one would love to move to the Outer Hebrides for a few years to learn Scots Gaelic. I know it's a useless language for the most part, but it's what I'm interested in, so I'll do it.

I agree with you on the languages, but I do think that we should copy them down for people who are interested in them to learn, rather than spending all that money on something that few people will ever use.

There was a movement a few years ago, might even have been in the 90s involving laser etched coins to preserve pretty much all the written languages we know, based on the style of the Rosetta Stone (the same phrase written in each language, so they had a "key"), heaps of them were sold and scattered.

edit: found it http://www.rosettaproject.org/disk/concept/

I don't think we should forget the languages, but I don't think we need all the one we've got.

 

[Wintermoot]

US English its well spread and not hard to learn

 

[Jester00]

one "world language" would be very cool.
i'm german, but english sounds way cooler and isn't hard to learn, so i think english would be a great world language.

 

[Tiny116]

Well My first thought is English.
But isn't it something like Spanish that's the most widely spoken language?

 

[shootthebandit]

nothing with any fucked up letters, i dont mind learning a new language but i dont wanna learn a new alphabet

im guessing itll be a similar to english considering english is the most widly spoken and takes alot from latin, french etc

 

[Danish rage]

Im a fairly retardet Dane and i speak and write English somewhat understandable.

I would dare say, that if you can´t speak English ur dummer than me. And that just sucks.

 

[theriddlen]

Pika pika pika pika pika pika

 

[hannan4mitch]

Imperial Gothic of course.

Semi-win.
According to canon, the main language is Low Gothic. Imperial Gothic (aka High Gothic) is basically fake Latin. Low Gothic is a mixture of Slavic and Germanic languages, with some Romance languages and some Japanese mixed in.