elgi, i'm sure there is something universal in all language that is language... and i'm sure there is a kind of universal "language"
i mean formal rules for a language or what is known as mathematical formal logics... because it is something a priori (in kantian and post-kantian sense)... it is not something innate as it has to be learnt and it can't be truly deduced from any natural language but it is still universal
i'm not believing that english is becoming an universal language... it's becoming a quite widespread language, true... maybe a worldswidespread language what is really different, but anyway what is the part of world population who speaks (even really badly as myshelf) english... 5%? 6%?... roman empire had imposed latin best i think and yet latin was not a true universal language either... still it was in a certain way a simple language... even if english was 99% percent and it's really not the case, it would not be universal as the remaining 1% not speaking english would not be able to share mental categories that are implyied in english as a collective language...
but it was not really what i mean about esperanto... as it is esperanto semantics is entirely an heir of latin origins languages... so it may be that it has the color of universal for someone who comes from a european language... but it is almost totally not understandable for someone who has a different language's culture... and it is probaly the main part of the world's population actually.... trouble is: why should an universal or so called universal language have a latin root rather than an indian root or a chinese root or an arabic/semitic root? and if we want to integrate non european language in a universal language how can logical differences between these languages be conciliated? i don't think there is any solving to these questions...
