Would the world be a better place when we would all speak the same language? It is tempting to think so. The language barrier stands in the way of much understanding. That’s why the Polish physician, Ludwig Zamenhof, created Esperanto as a universal language in 1887. Millions learned the language but the goal of universal understanding was never achieved. Perhaps clever new ear phones developed by Google can do the job. The earbuds connect wirelessly with Google’s latest smartphones that have software that can translate 40 spoken languages nearly in real time—or at least, fast enough to hold a conversation.