World Governments and People Should Abandon their Native Languages and Adopt English

I propose that all the world's governments and people should dispense with their non-English languages and adopt English. Sweden has already taken this route by making English compulsory in public education. Most Swedes speak English in addition to Swedish. Argument 1: The convergence toward English is inevitable. It is currently recognized as the language of trade, business and diplomacy. This status creates an economic incentive for people all over the world to learn English. People are responding to this incentive (see Argument 7). Having a single language will benefit the world therefore this inevitable convergence should be hastened. Argument 2: People of different nationalities will have more efficient access to each others perspectives. This will promote greater understanding and will contribute to a sense of fraternity among different peoples. A greater sense of fraternity and increased understanding would arguably contribute positively to world peace. Argument 3: The world of culture will be expanded. People of the world will have a greater and enhanced variety of music, movies, books, television shows, etc.. to choose from. Argument 4: The machinery of free trade will be lubricated with the advent of a common language. Greater free trade is known to lower prices on products and services and promote innovation. Companies in different parts of the world could more efficiently work toward achieving shared business goals. Free trade working in a homolingual (forgive the neologism) world could more efficiently locate jobs to people who would benefit from them the most. This would additionally benefit the employer and improve the world economy. Argument 5: The world of ideas would not be limited by linguistic zones. A person who speaks a given language would not have to wait for a book written in another language to be translated into his or her own. This would obviously have beneficial consequences for world-wide enlightenment. People would be able to read newspapers and watch news broadcasts from any part of the world. This would contribute to an understanding of a diversity of views. News organizations may become less bias because, in order to obtain the largest share of the world market, appeals to nationalism and local prejudices could not be made. Argument 6: Tourism would clearly be enhanced. Tourists would no longer feel limited (as some do) to visiting countries that are known to have a service sector which speaks their language. This would have a beneficial impact on world trade (see Argument 4). Argument 7: Though I personally wish I could say that the homolingual world should speak French or another romance language, I believe English is the most logical choice. At least a third of the world's people already speak English as a first language. However, more people speak English as a second language than any other. This is proof that there already exists a natural gravitation toward English. This natural momentum toward English should be utilized toward the fostering of a world language. English most likely already has more words than any other language proving that it is a highly expressive and competent language. A global convergence to English would cause even more words to be imported into the languages adding to its utility. Most English words are of Latin origin and a very large number of them are of Greek origin. This linguistic connection to ancient learning is useful for understanding the vocabulary of subjects such as philosophy, science and other areas of learning. Argument 8: Modern software is riddled with bugs and inelagancies pertaining to the correct encoding and rendering of the worlds languages. Unicode and other encoding systems have made it possible for programmers to write software for any writing system. However, because there are so many issues in doing this, many days are spent in efforts to render and store characters using these troublesome encoding systems. The simple Latin alphabet encoded in 8-bit ASCII is virtually flawless in terms of computer recognition and comprehension. The result is that English renders very well and is easy to work with for a programmer. Asian characters and even many European alphabets cause significant amounts of time to be spent getting them working correctly. Argument 9: Creating bi-lingual content, digital or otherwise is human effort which could be better employed. An unknown amount of money is spent translating books, creating subtitles and rendering signs into two or more languages. The world would be a more efficient place with out these unnecessary expenses. Argument 10: Though learning foreign languages may be fun for some people, it is likely that there are better subjects students could be spending their time on. After the advent of a homolingual world, foreign languages classes could be replaced with other electives from which society may likely benefit more. Note that this wouldn't be the end of polyglotism. There would still be dead languages to be learned such as Greek, Latin, or French for example.