Here is the big thing that people are missing, that the specificity of Thaumaturgy writeups were important worldbuilding disguised as mechanics. There were no "+1 to breeding a horse" or "roll Occult to emulate 21st century science" Procedures, never has been, nor was there anything of "physics" in the particulars save that of people who want an easy strawman to rail against. Husbandry and Enchantment were not the end-all-be-all of the things, and without elaborating on the actual practices being made, you lose out on an entire foundation which sets up what Creation is intended to be.
Like, lets take a fucking look at this really, using Oadenol's Codex:
Even in the Art of Alchemy, it tells you how the Magical Materials are created outright, and spots you a difficulty to attempt by yourself. It tells you how to define unidentifiable or magical substances with specially-prepared plates, it establishes the kind of basic healing (which defaults to "As Exalted"), temporary-buff and utility practices mortals have access too ("Thaum is lame because its for making soap" goes here, but that's a single wildcard Procedure out of the list). It shows how you can make basic explosives and poisons, as well as low-tier "Artifacts" like 8-Scream Devil Powder without hauling out the Craft rules, explaining their prevalence.
Art of Astrology lays out in its very description that the sky is alight with stars for every god and creature, that the Exalted and essence-wielders can defy predictions of fate, and that even the Loom does not enforce exact events where free will would prevent this. On the ground level, it gives the closest thing to "personal-scrying" that mortals have access too, which means that the information they can glean from out of Nowhere includes: Someone's date of birth, a major competency (Favored Ability), the status of someone being Exalted or blessed by a god/powerful destiny, a prominent passion (primary Virtue), and determining whether something is composed of Starmetal or not (its subtle, not rippling rainbow-steel!).
Arts of the Dead shows that people can choose to go into the Underworld willingly and back again via shadowland borders, establishes that summoned ghosts are audible and visible but immaterial unless its in a shadowland, shows that its possible for mortals to see and identify ghosts and dead spirits with only proper preparation, why blood magic is so widespread, how to set up sentries or glean information about a massacre site using the skulls of the dead and asking questions about what it has seen since its body died, and keeping crude intelligence and cunning for hungry ghosts longer than three days.
Art of Demon Summoning establishes that yes, mortals Can go tapping into the surrender-oaths, even if only to peel them open for a bit to permit a demon passage through, not exact servitude. There is literally a procedure for contacting a demon within Malfeas and abusing the five-day-delay to ask about future events, which is another "everyday people can be stupid enough to try this" plot hook.
Art of Elemental Summoning follows the same general structure of Demon Summoning, including elemental-sight, but uses its wordcount to point out that yes unworked Jade stores elemental essence within it, and pieces of it can be used as a medium to invoke magic in ways the other materials do not. It also shows how mere mortals can duplicate minor elemental effects on objects (like a single use of Elemental Benediction, for up to a scene).
Art of Enchantment shows how little education is necessary to determine if something is magical or not and for what purpose it serves. It is a Difficulty 1 Occult roll and takes about five minutes. It shows that enchantments can apply temporary colors or textures to objects, transfer magical properties from one object to another, and creates a sub-tier for non-Artifact Talismans of the "reroll a thing/+1 to a thing" variety as Warding Talismans.
Art of Geomancy is the most important one, because it actually illustrates the ways that Creation's mortals interact with the land in the form of magical demesnes and dragon-lines. Notably, they can Find them and recognize them, the exact type of essence at work, and even the stress-points which could cause them to react violently. Using a Hearthstone, someone can follow it directly back to the manse which created it. Furthermore, Geomancy allows someone to locate spirit sanctums and fiddle with the essence-respiration of the spirit inside, usually provoking it to come out and see what the nuisance is. And finally, it get to Actual scrying and clairvoyance on objects or people within several miles through the use of an arcane link.
Art of Husbandry gets the most flack for being "micromanage your crop yields and cows" but the point here is that it establishes this level of sophistication is Commonplace. Judging a diseased or magical creature apart from a normal one, warding a crop from pests, these are Basic tricks that literally anyone with the tiniest bit of occult dabbling can accomplish, while summoning up herds or flocks of animals, if not communicating with them simple instructions to follow, require only a bit more work than that. It can also summon people, including Exalted, to travel to a given place as Unnatural Mental Influence, albeit weakly-enforced. This shit is Important to know!
The Art of Spirit Beckoning is a brief one, but is a worthwhile note because it follows up on the Dead/Demon/Elemental-sight variants so that yes, mortals can see immaterial gods with preparation as well. The presence of the Hecatomb and the Tauroboleum of Ahlat's cult as examples show just how involved the greater rituals can be, and how they extend into full-production ceremonies.
And now we get to the Art of Warding and Exorcism, and I think people don't really give it enough credit for how much kit it actually lays out for mortals. "Warding" means more than just keeping something out, but also forcing it to spend Willpower to approach, triggers alarms which can be keyed to specific things, magically locks doors and gateways. "Exorcism" means not simply blocking a possessing spirit, but also physically striking immaterial foes and demarking out a place where that spirit cannot Be for an extended period of time, from hours to weeks. This is readily-available stuff, meaning that mortals are not hapless victims to supernatural ploys.
Lastly, we have the Art of Weather Working, which is also brief but it says a lot about mortal interaction with the supernatural world in its own way, by specifically noting that the Council of Winds are what determine Creation's weather, under the orders of the Bureau of Seasons, but are willing to provide information about their doings and even alter the courses of weather patterns with little prompting for brief times.
ALL of this information is contained in just the general writeups, and presented all in one place, rather than seeded out across multiple sections across several books as throw-away lines actually shows that Creation actually has a lot more going for it than just being rudimentary Bronze Age dirtfarmers giving their pigs +1die against plague and wearing iron nails for -1 die against Fair Folk glamours. And ALL of this gets tossed aside completely when you dumb it all down to that level of "roll some dice and make shit up," making the setting and game infinitely poorer for the omission.
