Language Extinction and the Spread of Esperanto

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) estimate that, "if nothing is changes, half of the 6,000 plus languages spoken today will disappear by the end of this century. With the disappearance of unwritten and undocumented languages, humanity would lose not only a cultural wealth but also important ancestral knowledge, embedded, in particular, in indigenous languages"(http://www.unesco.org/ new/en/culture/themes/endangered-languages/). To help offset massive language extinction in the coming century, linguists interested in language preservation are doing all they can to document languages while their last living speakers are still alive. To discover what languages are in danger and where their speakers are located, see the Endangered Languages Project interactive map. Then browse their video collection and check out their "Knowledge and Sharing" links to learn about what they are doing to preserve these endangered languages. 

While it might be depressing to think about massive language death, there are those who embrace the idea of shedding languages and the linguistic diversity they embody. They advocate instead that we should all embrace one transnational language. Esperanto is the most widely spoken "constructed, international, auxiliary language" in the world. It was invented by L.L. Zamenhof, aka. Doktoro Esperanto ("esperanto" = "one who hopes") and introduced in the 1887 publication, Unua Libro. The purpose of the new language was to provide an easy to learn, politically neutral, transnational language of peace and world unity. It is estimated that Esperanto is spoken by one hundred thousand to two million speakers worldwide today, with approximately one thousand native speakers. Lean more from One Show: 

What do you think? Is linguistic diversity something priceless, a phenomenon to be embraced and protected? Is it something that only creates divisions and discord, a phenomenon to be discarded as quickly as possible? Is there some in-between position, one that embraces diversity and unity simultaneously?