China and Korea had incredibly inconvenient and expensive moveable type that required extensive amount of labor. Page setting in western alphabet was much easier and Gutenberg invented good alloys to make it even easier. In addition Europe benefited from improved paper making technology like pulp mills (developed in Islamic world)

Just saying that Chinese had "moveable type" omits the technological and practical considerations that made European printing press success.

ps. Moveable type did bring some educational and political changes in China (centralism, opposition against government) but the effect was limited because Chinese writing system and inferior printing press technology.

> Just saying that Chinese had "moveable type" omits the technological and practical considerations that made European printing press success.

OK but just saying the Europeans had a superior printing press omits the the radical thinking and acting that made Martin Luther's doctrines a success.

Your position is like saying, baseball became America's national pass-time because of radio. Yes, radio existed and helped, but it wasn't radio broadcasts of soccer or regional hopscotch tournaments. Baseball made a particular appeal to the soul of the people and the time which soccer and hopscotch did not. The medium is not the message; content is king.

Well, was China's state religion in 1000AD as corrupt and perverse as the Church in 1500? Was China's culture similar to European one when it comes to reacting to said pervasive societal injustice? If you cannot convincingly reply "yes" to this questions, your objection is invalid.

And you cannot. Why would the people uprise, printing press or not? Hell, Confucius was practically the inventor of meritocracy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucianism#Meritocracy). See also the Chinese chapters in the "Penguin history of the world" by Roberts.

On the other hand, there isn't a single "heretic" that made a sliver of difference before the printing press, while after you have countless ones, Luther being merely the first.

This also views all theological/philosophical systems as equal - perhaps the 'need' for reform was 'dictated' by the actual 'incorrect' religious circumstances of the particular system luther existed in (late middle ages RC in the west)

China was in the Song dynasty at the time, which was a still-record-breaking Golden Age the likes of which the world has rarely ever seen before or since. There was no reason for a reformation or religious revolt when things were going so well.