[sakeido]

I really would argue that our system is more simplistic. I think that the incredible amount of permutations possible in other world music systems is because most of them have not or did not until recently develop a system of writing their music down, while we have been recording our music for centuries now and have been thinking in the same musical alphabet for almost as long as we have been writing down our music. I would think that if by consistently learning music by ear for generations upon generations and having as diverse of religions and beliefs as there is in the East that would just add to the complexities of the music those societies would develop.
Conversely, here in the West we have been mostly consolidated under one or two very powerful religions for a long time (and they have vast influence on the development of music in a society) and have been moving towards complete homogenization for centuries, so we just didn't have the opportunity to develop musically like some other cultures have.