Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-72.129.239.20-20140901022712/@comment-85.179.202.246-20140906105313

research and development is not done in the imperium, as such, technological progress is deemed heresy, the IoM /mechanicum only wants to get back to the pre age of strife level. this also has to do with the AI revolution, technology is seen as dangerous and has to be strictly controlled.--> religion

the machine religion also means that people do not really know "how" somehting is done, only that something is done and as such if certain worlds are lost or people with knowledge die,  the mechanicum cannot maintain it's standards. also think of it this way.. the imperium is vast, research and development can lead to things that are not in the interest of the imperium, the machine religion simply controls that part of life very well. it maintains stability.

also: the imperium had discoeverd technologiccally superioir humans (interex, auretian technocracy)

not even talking about how the wider imperium does not bring it's worlds up to a standard but like to maintain cavemen and medieval people (for fighting)

a machine spirit is something like an AI in higher developed machine0( see f.e. land raiders)s, however: the machanicum believes that this machine god is in every piece of technology, even an automatic rifle (which has no electric parts whatsoever)