The Artificial "Perfect Language": Why Did It Ultimately Lose Out to a Wildflower?

Have you ever felt that learning a foreign language is just too difficult?

Endless vocabulary to memorise, impenetrable grammar, and all sorts of peculiar pronunciations. We exert ourselves tirelessly, simply hoping to communicate with people from diverse cultural backgrounds and explore the wider world.

At times like these, a thought might occur to you: wouldn't it be wonderful if there were a super-simple, perfectly logical universal language that everyone could pick up instantly?

Well, believe it or not, over a century ago, someone actually turned this idea into a reality. It's called Esperanto.

Its creator was a Polish doctor who witnessed the numerous conflicts arising from misunderstandings between people speaking different languages. Thus, he sought to create a neutral, easy-to-learn language to break down barriers and connect the world.

The idea sounded absolutely flawless. Esperanto's grammatical rules were reportedly learnable in a single afternoon, and its vocabulary, largely derived from European languages, was very approachable for many.

However, over a century has passed, and this "perfect solution" has largely been ignored, becoming little more than a niche hobby among language enthusiasts.

Why?

The answer is simple: because it's like a meticulously designed plastic flower.

Perfect, But Lacking Scent

Imagine a plastic flower. It's vibrantly coloured, perfectly shaped, never wilts, and requires no watering or fertilising. From any perspective, it fits the definition of a 'flower', perhaps even more 'standard' than a real one.

But you would never truly fall in love with it.

Because it has no life, no soul. It lacks the story of rooting itself in the soil through wind and rain, and certainly doesn't possess the unique fragrance that attracts bees and butterflies.

Esperanto is that plastic flower in the linguistic world. Its grammar is neat, its logic clear, having eliminated all the "irregular" troubles. Yet language is never merely a cold tool for exchanging information.

The true vitality of language lies in its unique "scent" – which is culture.

Why do we bother learning a new language?

We learn English not just to understand instruction manuals, but more importantly to grasp the lyrics of our favourite English songs, to comprehend the latest Hollywood blockbusters, and to understand that particular humour and way of thinking.

We learn Japanese because we want to personally experience the summer festivals in anime, to comprehend the sense of solitude within Haruki Murakami's prose, and to feel the 'artisan spirit' (匠人精神, shokunin kishitsu) prevalent in Japanese culture.

The Chinese concepts of 'Jianghu' (江湖 – the wandering, broader world of martial arts or society), 'Yuanfen' (缘分 – a deep-seated, predestined connection), and 'Yanhuoqi' (烟火气 – the warmth and vitality of everyday life, the human touch), or the English terms 'Cosy' and 'Mindfulness', all have centuries of history, myths, customs, and ways of life embedded behind them.

This is the true allure of language, the "fragrance" that entices us to overcome immense difficulties to learn it.

And Esperanto, this "perfect flower" born in a laboratory, precisely lacks all of this. It carries no shared memory of a people, no coexisting literature, music, or cinema, and certainly no witty banter or internet memes circulating in the streets and alleys.

It's perfect, but it's tasteless. People don't become passionate about a mere tool, but they do become captivated by a culture.

We Don't Need Uniformity, But Connection

So, was that dream of a "globally interconnected world" misguided?

No, the dream isn't wrong; it's simply the method of achieving it that needs an upgrade.

What we need is not to replace the world's myriad, vibrant, and diverse "wildflowers" with a single "plastic flower", but rather to build a bridge that connects all gardens. We shouldn't sacrifice the unique culture and history behind each language for the sake of communicative convenience.

In the past, this seemed out of reach. But today, technology is making this dream a reality in an even more wonderful way.

Tools like Lingogram are excellent examples. It's a chat application with built-in AI translation, allowing you to communicate freely with anyone, anywhere in the world, using your native language.

If you utter "yanhuoqi" in Chinese, the other person can immediately see the most fitting translation and explanation. You don't need to be a language expert first; you can directly experience the authentic essence of the other person's culture.

It doesn't erase the unique "fragrance" of each language; instead, it allows you to smell the perfume of another flower more directly and effortlessly.

Perhaps this is a better way to connect the world: not by eliminating differences, but by embracing and understanding every distinction.

After all, true communication begins when we are willing to appreciate our differences.