I should add, though, that there are some surprising exceptions to universality out there, like the lack of certain (prima facie important) colour terms or numbers.

However, as someone who used to study languages passionately, I came to reject the stronger versions of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (language determines thought). One gradually comes to see that, though differences can be startling, the really odd omissions are often just got around by circumlocutions. For example, Russian lacks the highly specific past tenses English has (was, have been, had been, would have been, would be), but if there is any actual confusion, they just get around it with a few seconds explanation. Or in the Japanese example, even supposing it were true, I would expect some other formalized way of showing gratitude; hence "thanks" the concept would live on even if there was no word used in similar contexts to English "thanks."