Speaking broadly, so far I have the following picture of the history of the human kind:
Homo sapiens appeared in Africa 74 thousands years ago. About 2400 years ago was the peak of the Ancient Greece civilization, 1900 years ago - that of the Ancient Rome. The Mesopotamia's civilization was founded more than 5000 years ago and lasted for 3 thousands years.
Then there were countries in Europe, having spent the period after the fall of the Roman Empire in Dark Ages and complete misery, the Russian state's emergence from the 800s, with its majority of citizens being peasants - for long thereafter, until about a thousand years later.
And then there was Renaissance in 1300-1400s, about 600 years ago, then the beginning of the scientific revolution, the Enlightenment of 1700s, then the industrial revolution and then the modern world.
So, the leap between the misery of the Dark Ages - long working hours, most people being peasants and working from sunrise to sunset to simply sustain their existence, and the scientific revolution, that allowed me to type this very message, took only about a thousand years; the period between the beginning of the Enlightenment and the first plane; the French revolution and the modern world with the Internet - about 200 years.
So I can't help but question - why did it take so long before the Renaissance and the Enlightenment? What have human species been doing for those 73 thousands years? At first, I thought it was because there was simply no way to do science - everyone had to survive. But then again, while in societies of hunters and gatherers people may have been quite equal in terms of their poverty, in agricultural societies, it seems to me, the inequality increased, thus allowing the wealthy class with leisure time - time, that could be used for discovering the laws of nature and creating tools - at their desposal to appear.
Why wouldn't for instance, pharaons of the Egypt invent a plane or discover some physics laws? Why wouldn't other nobles of that time? What about the kings and nobles of Europe after the 9th century? Why wouldn't Roman emperors or wealthy citizens?
Why no one managed to discover electricity and how it can be used to convey information? Why no one managed to invent a plane or at least a glider - not for the lack of trying: the attempts were made, as far as I know, none was really successfull (for instance, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbas_ibn_Firnas#Aviation tried to jump of with hand-made glider, but injured himself, it was the 800s - and the first glider wasn't made until a thousand years later). Leonardo da vinci in 1500s also tried to make a flying machine - but it wasn't implementable and had to wait for 400 more years.
This question is too broad and covers far too many topics for it to be explained here. I don't even know if there's an academic consensus on the subject.
However, I need to pull you away from the idea that people can just discover new science theories or make new inventions whenever they want. For these things to come about, there must be a need, a desire, the necessary resources, and the necessary prior knowledge.
To build their flyer, the wright brothers had to first build a wind tunnel to test and calculate aerodynamics. The requires someone to have invented a small gas engine, which required someone to figure out and gas, someone to figure out the turbine, someone to figure out cylinders and and constructions, someone to figure out how to make the steel cast for it, someone to figure out how to make steal, etc etc. For the Wright brothers to calculate the lift needed for their airplane, someone needed to have actually calculated the lift equation, which means someone needed to have discovered lift, which means someone needed to have discovered how air currents work, which means someone need to have discovered how air works, etc etc.
During the Sengoku period, Japan's military techniques advanced rapidly. But in the 200+ years of the Edo period there was virtually no change. Why? Because there's no need to advance the military during peace time. Why waste money building and rebuilding castle keeps when it's never going to be used?
So the only thing I can say to you about why certain theories weren't discovered or certain inventions weren't made and popularized, is that the timing and condition simply wasn't right.