Great write-up. As a boomer, I recognize a lot of your arguments have echoes from the past. History is a great teacher. Going to the moon was considered pointless when there are so many problems on Earth that could benefit from that money and effort. But the spin-off tech has revolutionized our modern world from drones to medicine to food preservation to clothing and more and more and more. When Michael Faraday gave demonstrations showing the connection between magnetism and electricity, it was waved off as "parlor tricks" that didn't have any practical value. Today, Faraday's work on electromagnetism is the foundation for 95% of our entire world's economy. George Bool. His math was laughed at by his contemporaries. It languished unused until it became key to modern computer programming. But for every Faraday, Einstein, Newton, etc. there were thousands of people who's research and efforts just didn't go anywhere. Like taking random paths through an unexplored jungle, no one knows which path will lead to the prizes and wonders of the world. We have to explore all of them and be willing to accept (and fund) the failures. Block chain, self driving, augmented reality, artificial intelligence... probably none of those will end up how we thought they would. But they will contribute to the whole. Radio was originally intended to be a person-to-person communication device, while telephone was originally intended to pipe musical performances to remote concert halls. How we choose to use a thing is not determined by it inventor.