Just because you aren't a web developer doesn't mean you can't dabble in web development. Take 30 mins to play with their starter kit [1] or just play around inside JSFiddle [2]. Now imagine being able to encapsulate your native components the same way.

IMO encouraging you to isolate state management is the biggest win. JSX and component-based abstraction are really fucking powerful too though.

[1]: https://facebook.github.io/react/docs/getting-started.html

[2]: https://jsfiddle.net/reactjs/69z2wepo/