esperanto_story1-1, Exercise 1: Evidence for two claims

Model answer (check the details):

Claim: "Nobody speaks it."
Evidence to look for: published estimates of the number of speakers and how they were made (surveys, membership lists, language tests, census questions); the attendance at world congresses; the size of the online community and of the Esperanto Wikipedia; accounts of native speakers.
Where to find it: the Universal Esperanto Association, linguists' surveys, national censuses that ask about Esperanto, language databases, and the congress reports.
Caution: figures range widely depending on what "speak" means (a few phrases, fluency, regular use), and the numbers are estimates.

Claim: "It was meant to replace all other languages."
Evidence to look for: what the founder wrote in the 1887 foreword and later; what congress declarations said (for example, the Declaration of 1905); what opponents quoted.
Where to find it: the Unua Libro, the Fundamento, Zamenhof's speeches, and historians who compare his words with how critics described them.
Caution: quotations may come from translations or from later retellings. Compare the original text.

Care: say what each source can and cannot show.