> They just took ideas from abroad - industrialization, capitalism, mass literacy, adult male suffrage, (some) democracy (pre-WW2) - and adopted them.

Japan is more modern because it already had a very advanced, well-organised society. Japan is more like the UK in that it's a source of civilisation rather than a recipient. However it hugely calcified around religion, where the Emperor is basically god, and the utter decimation of that belief upon two nukes landing on Japanese soil meant that Japan had a huge reset, and took on - extremely well - the latest and greatest at the time, which was UK and US-based lower-case liberal capitalism.

> Japan is more modern than India because it wasn't colonized

This is backwards. Japan was organised, modern and hard-working enough to not be colonised throughout history.

> > Okay, but it's also a huge country the size of a continent

> And India isn't?

I think you need to bear in mind the conversation being had, rather than goldfishing through statements forgetting where they came from. This was: "The US has more slaves in it than anywhere else in Western Europe". Answer: "It's much larger than anywhere else in Western Europe." Nothing to do with India.