Which language should be spoken by the colonisers of Mars?

english only seemingly appears to be the best language of communication on Mars. Firstly, we don’t know how long its hegemony on earth is going to last. It surely must be a world language, that is a language which goes beyond the ethnic community which speaks it. the world spoke Greek for about 600 years, Latin for 1,700 years, French only for about 150, and English has been spoken, so far, for as many years. Is american english going to survive as long as Latin? It is uncertain when you become conscious of the death of great languages of the past like Greek, Latin, aramaic, Persian or Quechua.

Secondly, we can choose from as many as nearly 7,000 living languages, which we have at our disposal. Should the number of people who speak the languages be decisive? then, Mandarin would be best as it has been used for 2,000 years and is now spoken by over a billion people. But, we can equally well assume that the settlement of Mars will save the languages which are on the verge of extinction, e.g. Gaelic, which is used only by 50,000 people or, even better, by vilamovian, which is spoken only by 25 individuals. Specific language features can also be taken into consideration, such as, for example, the lack of perfect tense in american-Indian language Hopi, which would make it possible not to finish anything definitively.

Finally, there is a danger of never-ending disputes over the criterion for the selection of the Martian language. therefore, it would be best to decide on an auxiliary international language, which does not belong to anyone. the most widespread one is Esperanto. Its basics were developed in 1887 by a Polish-Jewish doctor Ludwik Zamenhof. There is hope that thanks to such a choice people on Mars will not share the fate of the builders of the tower of Babel.

We should remember that the universal language – which the universe knows – is the language of mathematics.

Ryszard Koziołek, Prof. PhD hab. Faculty of Philology Vice-Rector of the University of Silesia in Katowice