I’ve actually sometimes used external devices for non secure stuff and I find that its like 1/3rd chance I get an alert for that.

That’s the sort of stuff I SHOULD be getting an alert for.

What he's leaving out is that the AdMech usually kill the people who *do* try and do new scientific research as "hereteks", on the grounds that anything but holy ancient technology might be corrupted or otherwise dangerous. And when they aren't doing that, as with the Tau or Belisarius Cawl, we see that progress is very much possible. It's the AdMech stranglehold that's causing Imperial scientific knowledge to slowly decay rather than rebound, not so much material conditions.

No, that's another part of the material conditions. Because this also leaves out the primary reason innovation is dangerous - because AI and scrapcode are hiding everywhere in old poorly-understood tech, and experimentation is likely to release one or both, with catastrophic results up to and including loss of the planet.

As with most things in 40k, they're trapped in a terrible equilibrium by hostile forces, lack of ability to coordinate on anything but maintaining the status quo, and resource constraints. The system is an effective trap and they can't just wish their way out of the trap. (So they try to pray their way out, with the understanding that this won't work.)

Cawl is a Mary Sue and got an unlimited budget, no supervision, and 10,000 years, and the advances he made were still not that large. The T'au are already starting to have problems from AI and have only just barely begun to interact with the Warp enough for that to cause them problems, and therefore are still idealists who haven't had to make compromises with the fundamentally sapience-hostile nature of the universe. Both of them are pictures of what humanity looked like long ago before the universe had its way with them.

Those are are all big risks, but they're risks the Imperium mostly still has to deal with anyway. I'm inclined to read them using the times scientific innovation goes wrong as proof they must stick to the old ways, while ignoring the times their own ways go equally wrong, as mostly just standard hypocrisy.

Of course, people who are inclined to ignore the AdMech's excessive conservatism may also be inclined to throw out actual important safety tips like "don't make bargains with Chaos" out with the bathwater. Some things the AdMech view as blasphemous are genuinely dangerous. But "doing basic science/engineering" isn't one of them.

My read is that the AdMech mostly are the status quo the AdMech is caught in. No individual AdMech can just decide to be sane, but that's mostly because if they did they would be executed for blasphemy, not because everything they consider blasphemy would cause disaster. It's a classic "non-punishers get punished" dictatorless dystopia setup, with a layer of self-defeating paranoia brought on by the constant random disasters of a hostile universe.

Cawl and the T'au aren't the only examples of paths not taken, just particularly prominent ones. Sure, the T'au (and DAoT humans, people working with the Great Crusade era Emperor, etc) are/were relatively sheltered from Chaos compared to the Imperium,* but I don't think you can attribute their success solely to that. The Interex, for a more obscure example, did pretty well while existing in the same universe facing the same threats as the early Imperium, and are clearly intended as a "no, it doesn't have to be this way" moment. (And Chaos actively encouraged/tricked the Imperium into destroying them... make of that what you will.)

On the gripping hand, there are hints that the AdMech are a product of the Void Dragon's influence leaking out of its prison on Mars. So they might be better thought of as a slow Xenos corruption eating away at humanity than as one of humanity's own failures.

*(The Imperium also contributes significantly to their own Chaos problems by creating tons of negative emotions, oppressing people so they're desperate for an alternative, not training their psykers properly, etc. - there's a reason most Chaos units are human - but it'd definitely still be a huge issue even if the Imperium were perfect saints.)

I've heard it pointed out that alot of the AdMech's more dogmatic traits aren't that bad in a long term survival on an uninhabitable planet(you know like Mars during the age of strife) situation.

Knowing how the machine keeps the air in isn't as important as making sure it keeps doing so. Risking breaking something by taking it apart to learn how it works could kill people on the wrong systems. Innovating takes resources, resources that could be better allocated to maintaining already existing systems that do their job good enough. Ect ect ect

The issue is that by the time the martian people didn't need to follow these survival guidelines, they'd been practicing them so long it had become a religion, something not to be questioned, and anyone who did was putting everyone else at risk.

Essentially emergency protocols that weren't stopped once the emergency was over because they did them so long they don't even realize they were only emergency protocols

I don't think we can really comprehend how badly the Men of Iron traumatized the human race with their rebellion. We know that Age of Technology era humans had stuff that was practically magic, they were the masters of the material universe and all things bowed to them. And then they didn't. Ignoring the awakening of so many Psykers and the Warp storms that followed, the Men of Iron became the ultimate boogy man. Humans forgot about demons and replaced them with the Men of Iron. It fundamentally altered the way humans thing to the point that the very idea of a thinking machine was so terrifying, that everyone agreed that the nightmare factory that spits out Servitors was a better alternative.

That's why the AdMech is so terrified. They don't hate the concept of innovation. That's how new patterns are built. As long as you do all the paperwork, you can probably avoid being turned into Corpse Starch. Although some more dogmatic Priests will do it out of principle. They are pants shittingly terrified that they might make something that won't obey them.

That's just my 2 cents, anyway.

They actually do hate the concept of innovation. It is against their dogma. They rather firmly believe that everything which needs to be known is from the DAOT (which, to be fair, would cover most problems) and trying to innovate outside of the limited context of trying to get back to what was lost is tech-heresy.

There’s a reason that innovations are pretty much always couched under the statement of “We found a new STC fragment! What? No, you can’t see it, just take the equipment and stop asking questions.”

They don’t USUALLY have to yell at kids for doing cocaine off the urinal.