Here's my summary of suggested reasons for the choice of a thick stack.
Please add any I have missed.
Advantages
- Dust less visible
Not so. The dust ain't any further from the angle of the light.
- Stronger and less fragile sensor
Sensors are already very strong and doesn't need a protection against physical impacts, unless you are sticking your nail there all the time while mounting lens?
- Stiffer and less flexible sensor improves image stabilisation
You can get that with way other means than just with optical glass that is affecting the optical pathways. So no.... Simply using even sheet of titanium back of the sensor would do the same, without affecting optical pathway.
- Degrades performance of adapted lenses thus promoting sales of new 43/m43 lenses (advantage to Olympus not to the consumer)
Not really... Olympus had stopped selling the OM system way before 4/3 system. They didn't care anything about legacy like Canon or Nikon. They cared the future and how to make a small and light camera with image quality that meets the requirements (notice, Olympus is only one to define the system based the requirements of the final output quality, not to chase some fantasy of "more is better". They defined the system based what is the most needed image sizes, cropping requirements (based lack of focal lengths and sudden situations) based to empirical research in industry and KODAK.
But that is the disadvantage as consumers are not rational people, they are move by feelings and fear. If you say "You need 47Mpix to get good photos from your first born child" then D850 gets huge sales. Regardless that they images end up to be a 1-2Mpix.
Disadvantages
- Lens design made more complex and expensive
And how is that so? That is still the assumption.
- Degrades performance of adapted lenses thus promoting sales of new 43/m43 lenses (disadvantage to the consumer, not Olympus)
Why? The average consumer doesn't care about that! Even majority of the Sony A7 users are using system native lenses and not Canon or some legacy ones!
Designing a new system based a old lenses that are not in production and not optically anyways high enough for digital use is bad assumption!
- Heavier sensor degrades image stabilisation
You can always make sensor assembly lighter or heavier by limiting what is being moved up to some point. And if you have something heavier, it requires more energy to be moved somewhere (tries to stay dynamically stationary by its own mass) and it means you don't need to be so accurate with the energy to do small changes. While ultra light requires more precision for energy control.
So it would be the opposite that heavier is better. But up to the point. But if you want heavier, you wouldn't make a compromise to make things more expensive and complex in lens design, when all you need to do is to add a couple lead weights to the sensor assembly to make it heavier!
How have the above affected me?
- I've never had to clean a m43 sensor
Yes, sum of many factors but mainly the Olympus designed sensor cleaning system.
- I'm impressed by sensor stabilisation
Yes, Olympus has well researched and developed their version of the IBIS following Pentax lead.
- I've used adapted lenses and not worried about or even noticed any slight image degredation caused by the thick stack
There are, but in normal final output requirements those ain't visible. That is why majority of the lens sharpness tests, discussions, digital or optical correction etc are waste of time as you will not see the effect in final output! Only pixel peepers and gear heads get to see the results when they take the images out of the context.
That is why we can take a 42Mpix Sony A7rMk2 and E-M1 Mk1 and use in both cameras ISO 1600 and do a 20" wide print and you will not see a image quality difference in the conditions. If you take the magnifying glass and you focus to minute detail (1/60 of degree of view, meaning like a 3x3mm area in 20" wide print) you will find difference, but only when you have direct comparison side by side (identical scenes etc, meaning you carry two cameras to take photos from same scene) and when the scene is such that it can reveal the minute difference. And even then if you would step further than 10" viewing distance and place the prints on opposite walls, different rooms or even just little apart from themselves than side by side on table, you wouldn't see the different, nor care.
- I've never considered the sensor stack size when deciding to purchase a lens
Who really would? How many even knows what a sensor stack is or what its thickness does?
- The price I paid for my m43 lenses was determined by market forces far more important than sensor stack size considerations.
The price you pay is determined by the corporation based their target of profits or their target of quality (if they are having "hobby" business, more like Olympus does).
So, for me, if the thicker sensor stack is one of reasons I've never had to clean my sensor I'm all for it.
If it does allow you make photos as good by quality in final output as best of the FF cameras, then it is fine.
If it does help to maintain the camera performance, go for it!
If it does have more benefits than cons for photography, go!
Of course there is always a change that 4mm filter stack was a huge mistake from Olympus and they can't anymore fix it by any ways as m4/3 transition is gone. And why no one else want to make m4/3 lenses or bodies than Olympus as that thick filter stack is so terrible decision!