No monotheism

If we compare them to European, they were not so technology advanced. Because people do not try to find out how every thing that a god is supposed to make was really made. For example, why explain lightning by electricity when Zeus.

P.S. About evidence in the early Bible that Judaism had polytheistic roots before switching to one God is that His name, Adonai mean "my lords", not "my lord".
If that is true, then why was pagan Rome more advanced than any European civilization that followed until the Enlightenment?

For that matter, are you saying that the Chinese were not technologically far ahead of the West from the at least the 7th to the 17th centuries, arguably even right up until 1750? What areas was mid Imperial China behind the contemporary West?

Or the Inka, who, despite being inferior in some areas such as metallurgy and mechanics, were way better off than any state in contemporary Europe in sanitation, civil engineering, medicine and quality of life?

What about India? When Europe was in the Dark Ages and the Middle East was divided between Christian Axum and Byzantium and Zoroastrian Persia, India was in the Golden Age of the Guptas.

Anyway, as to the original question, a world without any significant monotheism (monotheism is found around the world in pockets, even the Pre-Columbian Cherokee were monotheistic, for example) probably would mean a world dominated by some fusion culture of Rome, India and China.

Without the Christian destruction of Roman or Ancient Egyptian learning or the Islamic slave trade, Invasion of India or its isolation of Ethiopia, the world would probably develop faster.

I say this because the Romans would be able to act bring the knowledge of older civilizations together and build on it, the Egyptians had a strong grasp of empiricism and the basis for the scientific method, India had its tradition of philosophical pluralism and China, as in OTL, would have its tradition of valuing education and study. In contrast to Buddhism, Confucianism and, from what I understand, Hinduism and Roman Religion, Christianity and Islam make faith of paramount importance and tend to play down good works by making them secondary in importance to, or effectively completely neglected, as in the case of much Protestantism, faith.
 

SunDeep

Banned
If that is true, then why was pagan Rome more advanced than any European civilization that followed until the Enlightenment?

For that matter, are you saying that the Chinese were not technologically far ahead of the West from the at least the 7th to the 17th centuries, arguably even right up until 1750? What areas was mid Imperial China behind the contemporary West?

Or the Inka, who, despite being inferior in some areas such as metallurgy and mechanics, were way better off than any state in contemporary Europe in sanitation, civil engineering, medicine and quality of life?

What about India? When Europe was in the Dark Ages and the Middle East was divided between Christian Axum and Byzantium and Zoroastrian Persia, India was in the Golden Age of the Guptas.

Anyway, as to the original question, a world without any significant monotheism (monotheism is found around the world in pockets, even the Pre-Columbian Cherokee were monotheistic, for example) probably would mean a world dominated by some fusion culture of Rome, India and China.

Without the Christian destruction of Roman or Ancient Egyptian learning or the Islamic slave trade, Invasion of India or its isolation of Ethiopia, the world would probably develop faster.

I say this because the Romans would be able to act bring the knowledge of older civilizations together and build on it, the Egyptians had a strong grasp of empiricism and the basis for the scientific method, India had its tradition of philosophical pluralism and China, as in OTL, would have its tradition of valuing education and study. In contrast to Buddhism, Confucianism and, from what I understand, Hinduism and Roman Religion, Christianity and Islam make faith of paramount importance and tend to play down good works by making them secondary in importance to, or effectively completely neglected, as in the case of much Protestantism, faith.

Thing is though, this isn't about a TL where monotheism isn't dominant, or where monotheism is insignificant, we're talking about a timeline where the notion of a God- and thus, of any god or gods- is never developed in the first place. Can you think of any historical civilisations where they had no notion of the concept of deities? And if you can, can you think of any of these which came into being independently, rather than as offshoots from an existing religious group which did believe in deities? Confucianism doesn't count, because it deifies the Emperor as a living God, and Buddhism doesn't count, because (A) Buddhism originated from Hinduism, and (B) Buddha himself stated that gods, devas, do exist. Personally, I can't think of any independently non-theistic religions or civilisations whatsoever...
 
Thing is though, this isn't about a TL where monotheism isn't dominant, or where monotheism is insignificant, we're talking about a timeline where the notion of a God- and thus, of any god or gods- is never developed in the first place. Can you think of any historical civilisations where they had no notion of the concept of deities? And if you can, can you think of any of these which came into being independently, rather than as offshoots from an existing religious group which did believe in deities? Confucianism doesn't count, because it deifies the Emperor as a living God, and Buddhism doesn't count, because (A) Buddhism originated from Hinduism, and (B) Buddha himself stated that gods, devas, do exist. Personally, I can't think of any independently non-theistic religions or civilisations whatsoever...
But that is not what you said either: You stated, roughly and with a lot of implying, that the West was more advanced than East Asia or those of the Americas because it had monotheism; it's logically irrelevant what one believes in one area of knowledge as long as one is correct in the area concerned. So, even though the Maya did human sacrifice and bloodletting, they still were great astronomers and mathematicians who invented zero.

Confucianism does not deify the emperor, for one thing because Confucius lived in Pre-Imperial China; not to mention that the emperor was not seen as a deity but rather as the "son of heaven", an assumed impersonal force. Finally, there is a difference between veneration and worship: Would you necessarily call visiting a tombstone "worship"? I wouldn't.

And Buddhism is indifferent to the supernatural. Not to mention that Hinduism also has an atheistic tradition; not that that matters, as Buddhism is separate from Hinduism, and not completely descended from it: As a matter of fact, Buddhism takes much from Jainism as well.

By the way, I don't see how your reasoning that, correct me if I am wrong, but: If any person/culture believes in any number of deities, it must be so that originally said person/culture only believed in one deity. This is a non-sequitur: There are other ways besides monotheism one could get to polytheism rather than adding gods to a hypothetical original and discrete deity (monotheism); for example, starting with pantheism or panenthism, and divide up the given supernatural space into numerous entities without having a single, discrete being (or, for lack of a better word in English, a deity). Alternatively, one could have transtheism, as in Jainism.

Finally, if we don't have any concept of deities, why would this impede progress at all, or, at the very least, outside of metaphysics? We might very well end up more functional, due to a lack of time and effort put into placating assumed deities, and rational, due to a lack of fear of divine punishment or longing for some unknown divine reward.
 
These are great responses! Thanks. I suppose when I wrote "monotheism" I was referring more to the Abrahamic tradition than, say, Aten trying to get everyone to worship him or one favorite god out of the Aztec pantheon. But I appreciate the responses.
 
Confucianism does not deify the emperor, for one thing because Confucius lived in Pre-Imperial China; not to mention that the emperor was not seen as a deity but rather as the "son of heaven", an assumed impersonal force. Finally, there is a difference between veneration and worship: Would you necessarily call visiting a tombstone "worship"? I wouldn't.
Confucianism isn't even a religion, it's a philosophy. It's not contradictory to be a Confucian and a Buddhist for example. It's only a religion if you consider stuff like Marxism to be religions as well.
 

SunDeep

Banned
But that is not what you said either: You stated, roughly and with a lot of implying, that the West was more advanced than East Asia or those of the Americas because it had monotheism; it's logically irrelevant what one believes in one area of knowledge as long as one is correct in the area concerned. So, even though the Maya did human sacrifice and bloodletting, they still were great astronomers and mathematicians who invented zero.

Confucianism does not deify the emperor, for one thing because Confucius lived in Pre-Imperial China; not to mention that the emperor was not seen as a deity but rather as the "son of heaven", an assumed impersonal force. Finally, there is a difference between veneration and worship: Would you necessarily call visiting a tombstone "worship"? I wouldn't.

And Buddhism is indifferent to the supernatural. Not to mention that Hinduism also has an atheistic tradition; not that that matters, as Buddhism is separate from Hinduism, and not completely descended from it: As a matter of fact, Buddhism takes much from Jainism as well.

By the way, I don't see how your reasoning that, correct me if I am wrong, but: If any person/culture believes in any number of deities, it must be so that originally said person/culture only believed in one deity. This is a non-sequitur: There are other ways besides monotheism one could get to polytheism rather than adding gods to a hypothetical original and discrete deity (monotheism); for example, starting with pantheism or panenthism, and divide up the given supernatural space into numerous entities without having a single, discrete being (or, for lack of a better word in English, a deity). Alternatively, one could have transtheism, as in Jainism.

Finally, if we don't have any concept of deities, why would this impede progress at all, or, at the very least, outside of metaphysics? We might very well end up more functional, due to a lack of time and effort put into placating assumed deities, and rational, due to a lack of fear of divine punishment or longing for some unknown divine reward.

For Pantheism, Panentheism and Transtheism to come into being, you still have to develop the concept of what a god is first. Come on, this is standard evolutionary theory. Do you really believe that it would have been possible for any forms of multi-cellular life to have evolved if there were never any single-celled organisms for them to have evolved from? The assertion just doesn't hold water. Look at the history of any polytheistic religion's pantheon, and you'll find that those various deities were all originally conceived and worshipped on their own locally before being brought together.

Granted, panentheism and transtheism are a different story entirely, as neither of these requires the assertion that their divine force is a 'god'. And one also has to recognise that panentheism and transtheism are only '-theisms' to reconcile the notion in our own majority monotheistic societies that their ultimate force could be deemed to be a divine entity (a god), or several divine entities (several gods). If the concept of 'god' is never developed by humanity, neither of these could possibly be deemed to be theistic belief systems.

Indeed, if any human civilizations were to arise ITTL, then its belief system would be akin to an ultimate version of transtheism, in a way that no belief system IOTL can be. TTL's transtheism would truly transcend theism, absolutely undefined by it because theism never arose. Such civilisations could indeed be extremely advanced, perhaps even more so than those of OTL by the present day, with the various quests for religious enlightment replaced by quests for the elusive 'theory of everything' which governs the universe.

But I'd be inclined to think not, because we're talking about an ATL in which no single human being ever personifies a higher order of being than themselves to revere or emulate- i.e, a god. Look at all of the religious beliefs in existence IOTL, so many of them utterly original and inconceivable to any normal person. Imagination is the source of all theories, whether religious, scientific, social or political. If not even a single certifiably insane human being can ever think 'outside the box' enough to develop the crackpot theory that there might be a 'god', then the clear limitations on humanity's imagination which would need to be imposed to make this feasible ITTL would imply that humanity's capacity to think theoretically or innovate, and hence the development of human civilisation, will have been similarly stunted.
 
These are great responses! Thanks. I suppose when I wrote "monotheism" I was referring more to the Abrahamic tradition than, say, Aten trying to get everyone to worship him or one favorite god out of the Aztec pantheon. But I appreciate the responses.

So... Maybe if we refocus the discussion to "Monotheist religions don't become dominant anywhere" rather than "the concept of a god doesn't exist." Because I'm pretty sure we covered the latter pretty thoroughly.
 

SunDeep

Banned
So... Maybe if we refocus the discussion to "Monotheist religions don't become dominant anywhere" rather than "the concept of a god doesn't exist." Because I'm pretty sure we covered the latter pretty thoroughly.

Okay, I can work with that, no problem. Just have more accommodating rulers who are more willing to have people worship whoever or whatever they want to worship. After all, look back at all our oldest monotheistic faiths- or for more modern monotheistic religions such as Sikhism and the Bah'ai Faith, at the earlier faiths that they diverged or borrowed from- and the one thing that they all have in common is that in the early stages, the subjects of the tyrannical, oppressive regimes that adopted them were forcibly converted to them; with the continued practice of any other religions, and the worship of any other gods than the officially sanctioned one, typically punished by torture and/or death.

You do this, and you'll have a freer, far more liberal world, with the potential for greater advancement as a result- unless the lack of the 'one true faith' concept ITTL means that people end up being labelled as 'savage' or 'civilised' solely on the basis of race and cultural heritage rather than religion, with the implementation of caste systems far more deeply rooted across the globe, akin to those in OTL's India, Imperial China and Imperial Japan, and even in the Greek and Roman Empires. In this case, while never reaching the depths of inequality and brutal tyranny that were plumbed in the course of OTL's human history, the sociopolitical landscape of TTL could well end up still being considerably more dystopian than our own by the time we reach the present day.

It's also likely that it'll be far more balkanised than our own present day world, with potentially thousands of independent nations, and any stable major empires which do arise more likely to be based on confederacies (or federal republics, later on) rather than single monarchies. Think of something like the Indianised kingdoms in South and Southeast Asia, but on a global scale, and after decolonisation. It'd certainly be interesting, but I can't say whether it'd be more advanced than ours or not. Which types of battles for dominance (war, trade, productivity etc) do you think would spur the advancement of human civilisation on a global scale more effectively- less frequent ones between a select few on a global scale as IOTL, or more frequent regional ones between several parties as ITTL? Something to think about...
 
If that is true, then why was pagan Rome more advanced than any European civilization that followed until the Enlightenment?

While I don't think that monotheism is the most relevant factor in this, i feel the duty to say that this is not really the case.

EDIT: just to point out a few examples: Medieval Europe had a generally better agricultural tech, as in, better crop rotation, better plows, better horse collars, etc. A field where European Middle Ages were, on average, far ahead the Romans was metalworking esp. rgarding cast iron and similar stuff (though I confess I don't know the details). They had also a significantly more vibrant philosophy and science (and in these areas, monotheism plays a part, although they of course build on Pagan Greek foundations). The Romans were arguably better at architecture and related stuff, although here social differences are probably more significant. I, for one, think that Notre Dame is far more impressive than the Colosseum, but it's subjective.
 
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Confucianism isn't even a religion, it's a philosophy. It's not contradictory to be a Confucian and a Buddhist for example. It's only a religion if you consider stuff like Marxism to be religions as well.
I basically agree with you; I just think we define religion differently: I effectively treat the word "religion" as just a organized and structured ideology.

Under this definition, Marxism would indeed be a religion, while disorganize spiritual beliefs would not. That's just my definition, though. :)
 
While I don't think that monotheism is the most relevant factor in this, i feel the duty to say that this is not really the case.
If you could give me some examples of Western civilizations in the aforementioned time period that were overall more advanced than Classical Rome: Not just in certain areas, like maybe weaponry (using gunpowder, from China) or printing (using movable type, from China), mathematics (zero is from Mesoamerica, the earliest documented heliocentricism is from Babylonia, and the Indians and the Japanese invented calculus, for the record; read about the Kerala School), steelmaking (a Subsaharan African invention; look up the Haya and their use of the Open Hearth Process if you don't believe me); in general and overall, a more advanced Western society than Classical Rome from the Fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Enlightenment. And, please specify which areas of human knowledge or the human condition they improved on and/or were ahead of Rome (or for that matter, all other civilizations beyond the Occident).

EDIT: I respond as follows: While I do accept that these are indeed improvements on Roman technology, they are not evidence of an overall more advanced civilization than all others: As for agriculture, crop rotation is originally from New Guinea (and it's not even as productive as the raised bed agriculture of much of Mesoamerica or the Andes, not to mention the agroforestry of Amazonia), that plow you talked about (the moldboard plow) is from China, the seed drill is Babylonian and improved upon by the Chinese.

As for metallurgy, China invented cast iron centuries before Christ, steel is Subsaharan African (as I mentioned before), the "Bessemer" Process and puddle iron are both Chinese. And yes, the Romans (and many other civilizations, such as the Inka) were still superior in engineering overall.

And how was Western philosophy more advanced than anyone else's? I would in fact argue that it's quite impractical, being obsessed with metaphysics and "big questions" and going around in circles with them, rather than solving concrete problems, like much Chinese philosophy, or being humane, just and kind, like India's Buddhism and Jainism (and I've read the Analects and the Mozi as well as the Republic, several Buddhist Sutras, the Daodejing and Politics, so I feel I know what I'm talking about).
 
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Okay, I can work with that, no problem. Just have more accommodating rulers who are more willing to have people worship whoever or whatever they want to worship. After all, look back at all our oldest monotheistic faiths- or for more modern monotheistic religions such as Sikhism and the Bah'ai Faith, at the earlier faiths that they diverged or borrowed from- and the one thing that they all have in common is that in the early stages, the subjects of the tyrannical, oppressive regimes that adopted them were forcibly converted to them; with the continued practice of any other religions, and the worship of any other gods than the officially sanctioned one, typically punished by torture and/or death.

You do this, and you'll have a freer, far more liberal world, with the potential for greater advancement as a result- unless the lack of the 'one true faith' concept ITTL means that people end up being labelled as 'savage' or 'civilised' solely on the basis of race and cultural heritage rather than religion, with the implementation of caste systems far more deeply rooted across the globe, akin to those in OTL's India, Imperial China and Imperial Japan, and even in the Greek and Roman Empires. In this case, while never reaching the depths of inequality and brutal tyranny that were plumbed in the course of OTL's human history, the sociopolitical landscape of TTL could well end up still being considerably more dystopian than our own by the time we reach the present day.

It's also likely that it'll be far more balkanised than our own present day world, with potentially thousands of independent nations, and any stable major empires which do arise more likely to be based on confederacies (or federal republics, later on) rather than single monarchies. Think of something like the Indianised kingdoms in South and Southeast Asia, but on a global scale, and after decolonisation. It'd certainly be interesting, but I can't say whether it'd be more advanced than ours or not. Which types of battles for dominance (war, trade, productivity etc) do you think would spur the advancement of human civilisation on a global scale more effectively- less frequent ones between a select few on a global scale as IOTL, or more frequent regional ones between several parties as ITTL? Something to think about...
I'm sorry, but may I see some sources for much of these statements? I just don't get your arguments' logic.

What caste system in China or Japan? It was more of a mixed sexist and meritocratic class system in China. For that matter, France until very recently had a caste system! All state societies have stratification, for better or for worse. In fact, the most egalitarian societies, Iroquois, Indigenous Californian and Taíno or the Indigenous Peoples of Groote Eylandt, happen to not be monotheistic!

"Balkanized"? China is "Balkanized". Europe is FAR more Balkanized than China is or the Inka Empire was.
 
Iroquois, Indigenous Californian and Taíno or the Indigenous Peoples of Groote Eylandt, happen to not be monotheistic!
The traditional Iroquois religion/spiritual beliefs are actually monotheistic. We (yes I'm Iroquois and a traditional) only have one Creator. The rest of the divine beings in our cosmology are spirit beings, not actual gods in the Eurasian polytheistic sense. But I agree that believing in "one god" doesn't mean that's a requisite for a complex society. That's some protestant work ethic nonsense.
 
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The traditional Iroquois religion/spiritual beliefs are actually monothestic. We (yes I'm Iroquois and a traditional) only have one Creator. The rest of the divine beings in our cosmoloy are spirit beings, not actual gods in the Eurasian polythestic sense. But I agree that believing in "one god" doesn't mean that's a requeset for a complex society. That's some protestant work ethic nonsense.
My mistake then :eek:; I had read that your religion was panentheistic.
 
If you could give me some examples of Western civilizations in the aforementioned time period that were overall more advanced than Classical Rome: Not just in certain areas, like maybe weaponry (using gunpowder, from China) or printing (using movable type, from China), mathematics (zero is from Mesoamerica, the earliest documented heliocentricism is from Babylonia, and the Indians and the Japanese invented calculus, for the record; read about the Kerala School), steelmaking (a Subsaharan African invention; look up the Haya and their use of the Open Hearth Process if you don't believe me); in general and overall, a more advanced Western society than Classical Rome from the Fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Enlightenment. And, please specify which areas of human knowledge or the human condition they improved on and/or were ahead of Rome (or for that matter, all other civilizations beyond the Occident).

EDIT: I respond as follows: While I do accept that these are indeed improvements on Roman technology, they are not evidence of an overall more advanced civilization than all others: As for agriculture, crop rotation is originally from New Guinea (and it's not even as productive as the raised bed agriculture of much of Mesoamerica or the Andes, not to mention the agroforestry of Amazonia), that plow you talked about (the moldboard plow) is from China, the seed drill is Babylonian and improved upon by the Chinese.

As for metallurgy, China invented cast iron centuries before Christ, steel is Subsaharan African (as I mentioned before), the "Bessemer" Process and puddle iron are both Chinese. And yes, the Romans (and many other civilizations, such as the Inka) were still superior in engineering overall.

And how was Western philosophy more advanced than anyone else's? I would in fact argue that it's quite impractical, being obsessed with metaphysics and "big questions" and going around in circles with them, rather than solving concrete problems, like much Chinese philosophy, or being humane, just and kind, like India's Buddhism and Jainism (and I've read the Analects and the Mozi as well as the Republic, several Buddhist Sutras, the Daodejing and Politics, so I feel I know what I'm talking about).

I am not sure about what do you mean with "overall more advanced". It's not easy to define a metric for that.
Your point seems to be that a lot of post-Roman advancement in Europe originated in other areas of the world and was taken by Europeans, as opposed to invented by them. Which is absolutely true, but I fail to see what has to do with anything. I was only comparing Pagan Rome with Monotheist Medieval Western Europe, noting that it had better technology in several areas.
Western Medieval philosophy had a lot of metaphysical focus when compared with Chinese thought, I fully agree with that. Oversimplifying a lot, one could say that Cinese though is driven by ethics, Indian thought by epistemology, and Western (ancient and medieval thought by metaphysics.
I do not think that any of the three can be described generally as being more "advanced" than the other in any meaningful way. Again, I was just confronting Medieval Europe with the Roman Empire.
Even here, it's hard to make sweeping comparative generalization, but there are areas where you can notice an increase in sophistication. Logic is one such area for example. It could be argued, closer to the topic, that interpretations of Plato and Aristotle based on a monotheistic worldview tend to be more ethically palatable; some Medieval commentaries on Plato's Republic (most notably the one by Averroes) emphasize women's "rights" and the Aristotelian take on slavery was largely abandoned. I did not mention that in my previous post, but a lot of Western Medieval philosophy was actually driven by original developments made in an Islamic context. Which remains relevant to the monotheism point, far less to "West is Advanced" point.

I've read Daodejing and Analects myself, together with much of Plato, some Aristotle and quite a ton of Medieval stuff (especially Arabic). I am less familiar with Buddhist sutras.
 
I was only comparing Pagan Rome with Monotheist Medieval Western Europe, noting that it had better technology in several areas.

Isn't that pretty pointless? You can also say that to comparisions of WWII Japan with Tokugawa Shogunate, Cultural Revolution China with Qing Dynasty, and Taliban Afghanistan and Safavid Afghanistan, all examples of lunatic fanatics >>>>> conservative monarchy technology-wise, but I don't think they are valid arguments at all.
 
Isn't that pretty pointless? You can also say that to comparisions of WWII Japan with Tokugawa Shogunate, Cultural Revolution China with Qing Dynasty, and Taliban Afghanistan and Safavid Afghanistan, all examples of lunatic fanatics >>>>> conservative monarchy technology-wise, but I don't think they are valid arguments at all.

Yes, I've embarked in a pretty pointless sidetrack.
I would disagree strongly with the notion that Medieval Europe is "lunatic fanatics" viz. the Roman Empire (which had occasionally its own fascinating ways to lunacy), but I get your point.
Sorry for derailing the thread.
 
Yes, I've embarked in a pretty pointless sidetrack.
I would disagree strongly with the notion that Medieval Europe is "lunatic fanatics" viz. the Roman Empire (which had occasionally its own fascinating ways to lunacy), but I get your point.
Sorry for derailing the thread.

Oh, I see the original point you meant to deliver to Oba, so sorry for the bashing:eek:
And by "all" I meant to only encompass my three examples.
 

SunDeep

Banned
I'm sorry, but may I see some sources for much of these statements? I just don't get your arguments' logic.

What caste system in China or Japan? It was more of a mixed sexist and meritocratic class system in China. For that matter, France until very recently had a caste system! All state societies have stratification, for better or for worse. In fact, the most egalitarian societies, Iroquois, Indigenous Californian and Taíno or the Indigenous Peoples of Groote Eylandt, happen to not be monotheistic!

Try reading this article. And as for Japan, ever heard of Yamato-damashii? Religion forms another level of stratification in human society, and one of the only ones where people can move up and down the ladder through conversion within their lifetimes, conveying a greater level of social mobility, especially when the monotheistic religion is evangelical.

Also, far greater emphasis tends to be placed on the religious ladder in societies dominated by monotheistic faiths, in which only the existence of a single god is recognised and all others are denounced; effectively, in these societies, more pressure historically tends to be placed on the bottom rungs of the ladder. The 'religious ladder' does have some elasticity, so the added pressure makes the ladder longer and increases the stratification markedly in the early stages- but inevitably, the strain becomes too much, the bottom rungs of the ladder snap off earlier as religious diversity is decreased more quickly, and in the long run, the ladder becomes shorter than those of polytheistic societies, with fewer divisions and potentially greater egalitarianism coming as a result.

"Balkanized"? China is "Balkanized". Europe is FAR more Balkanized than China is or the Inka Empire was.

I intended to start the last paragraph with 'if this is the case ITTL'; and I still believe that without monotheistic domination, you would have a world with far greater religious diversity and far greater cultural diversity than IOTL today, and it's only logical that this increased diversity would be reflected geopolitically in the existence of a greater number of entities with varying degrees of independence- either more nations, or more autonomous countries.
 
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