Idea for a Universal Translator
Chinese Ideograms -
Someone who speaks only Han Chinese can write a document in Ideograms and this document can be read by someone who speaks Mandarin but not Han.
The written form acts as the translator.
Thus: using either Chinese Ideograms or something similar - perhaps a new form of notation even.
Then develop software which writes any given language into this Ideogram form. (ie someone writes a document in their own language on a computer and the computer produces the document in "native form" and simultaneously in the form of Ideograms).
Whatever is written is now no longer in any particular language - a reader of this Ideogrammatic form (who is a speaker on any language) can now read it -
& of course if a software program exists that can write any language in this form then it must, by extension, be able to read it (provide a version of said document in the chosen language of the user).
Might help things along?