What always gets me is that they had some steam powered toys that would spin around and no one connected the dots that it could be used for something. I agree it is only a factor, but I cannot see how it didn't significantly reduce the motivation for anyone to just think about how work could be done better. They already had a solution and they constantly spent effort to get more of it.

Need a canal dug? Slaves. Need more fields tended to? Slaves. Need to mine more materials? Slaves. Need to manage the growing slave population? Believe it or not, slaves.

I just can't help but draw parallels to now and put myself in their shoes. When I sit down and think about problems I want to solve my mind often drifts to computers, robotics, and code because that is the world I live in and the tools I have available. If I grew up a well to do Roman home and had slaves, was brought up seeing all the problems they solved, and sat down and had a problem I cannot see how my mind would act any different. I would look at my world and the tools I have at hand. If it was a big project It was never the lack of some invention to take care of it. It was simply the number of slaves you needed. And guess what, they sure seemed to have the entrepreneurial spirit when it came to that in spades. What they invested in is a reflection of their thinking. I cannot stete enough how not expert I am at this, but these threads of thinking are not entirely bonkers.