It's not that Gnome can't, it's that it's not recommended. Gnome actually handles e.g. 150% scaling the exact same way as macOS does: render at a higher resolution then downscale. The reason it's not recommended over integer scales is that's inefficient, not that it doesn't work. The same recommendation exists on macOS. The difference in quality of life is macOS is generally better about assuming a given display should be high DPI the first time you use that display (and doesn't even show you the tiny options at all by default in such cases). So long as you select the same scale things should seem identical between Gnome and macOS though.

Windows/Android also use the superior direct render approach. The reason you always heard about Windows having horrible scaling was due to legacy Windows apps not having an understanding of how to use scaling, the actual scaling approach itself is very good (and most all apps still getting updates should be good by now).