What would the world be like today if Native Americans had been immune to diseases such as smallpox

How they would get similar immune system as Europeans? You would need some early POD achieve this. Either some earlier contacts or Natives have develope similar agriculture and urbanised civilisations what were established in Old World.

Without ASB this might be quiet difficult. And even if Natives would have same immune level it wouldn't help them much if them haven't too similar technological level and horses.
 
If you throw aside that ASB or a very old POD would be needed to finish this scenario, the result would be like any of the other continents. The natives would resist the white settlers, but through wars and technological superiority, the colonizers would be able to stake out colonies, but the process would be very slow, and America (and Canada) as we know it would not exist. North America would be completely colonised by 1900. The midwest/west of America would be like the Congo in Africa, an area largely unexplored, and very underdeveloped. Even then, there would be no American superpower, and there would be a lot of racial tension between the former colonizers and the natives. It would be something akin to South Africa. Still, a very interesting scenario!
 
If you throw aside that ASB or a very old POD would be needed to finish this scenario, the result would be like any of the other continents. The natives would resist the white settlers, but through wars and technological superiority, the colonizers would be able to stake out colonies, but the process would be very slow, and America (and Canada) as we know it would not exist

Africa from the Sahara to the Veldt, was considered as 'The White Mans Graveyard' due to Europeans being the ones lacking resistance to local diseases-- this didn't stop the Europeans from totally colonizing the place once was discovered that resources besides slaves existed.


Now the Mississippian Cultures had crashed decades before the Spanish arrived, having larger numbers of Neolithic technology warriors really won't slow things much, colonization will happen, but it would look much more like the rest of the Globe where the Europeans took over the leadership, but would be too many Natives to replace as OTL in North America. They would have some states/protectorates

In South America, the Aztecs were just too toxic to their neighbors, they would still ally with the Spanish to overthrow them, just might be a bit later.

Having a larger population is no guarantee for independence in the 19thC, see India.
 
We should remember, that no population had resistance to Variola or other major infectious diseases... The downturn in the population in Mexico during Spanish rule occurred shortly after Spanish rule began. Therein, there was seemingly multiple illnesses that devastated the natives and possibly even one that was local to Mexico and devastated the Spanish populace to levels similarly. We can say, that it’s very likely the Mexican natives were assailed in a short period by Variola (smallpox), Measles, Influenza and some sort of native disease or the Bubonic plague.
 
It wasn't local, Cocoliztli was a European disease like researchers were saying all the time. A strain of salmonella.

Anyway, if the immunity is to Smallpox only, the natives still suffer badly from a large number of other virgin field epidemics. the Incas might do better, without a smallpox epidemic causing a civil war a exactly the wrong time, and a few other nations may be hit less severely.

If its all the diseases... Europe may never acquire the taste for conquering far away places. It was distinctly inspired by the riches flowing from a South America that was totally wrecked by epidemics.
 
Taking the assumption as "As immune to smallpox as Europeans", I'll be honest and say I think you'd see a lot that was similar:

You'd see a lot of conversion to Christianity because these sort of universal religions are very effective at conversion.

You'd probably see Europeans indulging in a lot of arbitrage selling Eurasian technologies and goods or acting as mercenaries to gain access to precious metals. They may even be better off, earlier, without collapsed societies and with stronger trading partners.

You'd probably see settler colonialism in NE North America and some form of plantation settlement elsewhere in the Americas. The mid-point population densities and distributions that are out there don't inhibit some form of settlement economy.

The biggest differences would be that ethnically much of the Americas would be somewhat different, and it's hard to call what effects that would have.

Though assuming we're talking of identical immunity and not total immunity, Amerindian groups would still be somewhat hit by disease epidemics from time to time, and Europeans may be in more of a position to surge in numbers and strength in the aftermath.
 

Marc

Donor
Well, if you are really suggesting no disease holocaust, then you are looking at upwards of an order of magnitude greater populations.
In fact, there is an ongoing debate in the field of ethnohistory as to whether the native peoples were close to being at the maximum carrying capacity of food production given their level of agricultural skill set (in general of course, major differences between regions and groups).
 
To be fair, this is also assuming that colonization was an eventuality. Remember, even OTL most conquistadores died usually very painful deaths before they got anywhere. The Aztecs and Incas falling to the Spanish in such a short time ever the biggest ASB events of OTL since Alexander the Great and there is absolutely no guaruntee they would happen in an ATL. Not to mention there's nonzero evidence of diseases beginning to emerge in the Americas that could have been real Not Good to the Europeans, like cocoliztli.

Though, really, the issue is the how of all this. Like. How are you going to be able to accomplish this? The how will define everything after it.
 
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