Language and Nuclear-Waste Disposal. The Global Dominance of the Indo-European Languages

The storage of nuclear waste is an important social problem in today's society. Contact with nuclear waste is extremely dangerous to health, and high-level nuclear wastes may remain highly toxic for very long periods of time—perhaps thousands of years. A decision concerning where to dispose of highly toxic substances can have implications far beyond our own lifetimes. Once a site has been chosen, how can the fact that it contains highly dangerous substances be communicated to people living thousands of years from now?

Recently, the United States Department of Energy asked experts on language evolution to recommend how best to communicate the hazards of high-level nuclear waste to future generations. Taking into account that neither modern English nor any other language spoken today would be intelligible ten thousand years from now, the experts focused on nonverbal forms of communication (Figure 4-8). These included comic strips, paintings, signs, nonverbal symbols and oral histories. One expert suggested the establishment of an "atomic priesthood," or a class of people charged with warning future generations about the dangers of the place. Others suggested that forms of primitive art—analogous to the cave paintings of the Cro-Magnons—be used to communicate danger.

Figure 4—8. Nonverbal Communication. The top group of nonverbal symbols is a transcription of Amerindian petroglyphs. Such symbols are found inscribed in rocks in the western United States (top). They closely resemble inscriptions found in many other parts of the world, like these Egyptian cartouches (bottom). Such language may be intelligible across time

Ironically, there was consensus among the experts that the dangers associated with highly sophisticated modern technology could be communicated into the future only with the aid of prescientific and. indeed, preliterate communications devices. Is this a far-fetched scenario? Perhaps so. But consider that scientists studying Chernobyl, the scene of a major nuclear accident in 1986. have estimated that it may not be safe for anyone to enter the contaminated portions of the facility for up to seven thousand years.

The Global Dominance of the Indo-European Languages. The spread of the European-centered global economy has expedited the worldwide diffusion of Indo-European languages, which occurred as European civilization diffused around the world after the Age of Exploration. The European colonial powers exported their Indo-European languages to their colonies in Asia, Africa, and elsewhere.

In colonized areas, European colonial powers used their Indo-European languages to facilitate communication among different tribal groups within their colonies. These languages were used in business, government administration, trade, and education. Today, Indo-European languages remain the primary language of instruction in schools and universities throughout former European colonies.

In international communication, Indo-European languages are also dominant. For example, international treaties and trade agreements are generally written in Indo-European languages. Over 90 percent of scientific and scholarly research articles throughout the world are published in Indo-European languages. Among the Indo-European languages, English has achieved increased worldwide dominance during the twentieth century. For several centuries, the dominant economic powers in the world were the English-speaking British and Americans.

As a result, English has long been the predominant language of international business. As recently as 1900, however, German was the primary language of the scientific community and French was the international language of diplomacy. (The continued use of terms such as communique, coup detat, and detente illustrates the historical importance of French in international relations.)

During the twentieth century, English replaced German as the predominant language of science. More than two-thirds of scientific papers in chemistry and medicine are now published in English (Table 4-4). English is also the official language of international transportation and communication. Pilots and air traffic controllers at all international airports are required to communicate in English.

The current dominance of English in international communication is evident from the fact that 75 percent of the world's mail, 80 percent of the information stored in the world's computers, and 85 percent of international telephone conversations are in English.