Language could be more or less frozen wherever it stands at the time.
No it wouldn't -- language is for signaling, not only communication. There would probably be a common language for business and travel, but languages would continue to develop normally, since people would still want to use language to determine how they present themselves.
You're right, that was a little overbroad. I was thinking specifically in terms of the death or spread of individual languages.
If I have a device that translates anything said to me and renders it into my own language in real time - Pierre says something to me in French and I "hear" it in English - I never have to learn language other than my first, and my first - whether it's English or Tagalog or Swahili - is no more or less useful, no more or less universally comprehensible than any other.
So you're right that languages would still develop inte... (read more)
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