This is a good text, with “allocation of research funding on the basis of rapid societal impact is unethical”. Bandwagon funding priorities should stop; research funding is not fashion industry, nor mobile phone business, nor entertainment industry. Taxpayers who fund research are not electorate nor direct customers. When funding tries to please the crowds / get into news, the strategic balance suffers. Therefore, I believe, internal regulation of research funding priorities, with all the ivory-tower counter-arguments, has better chances to achieve fundamental progress long term. Independence of academia is an utopia, but it is good to have ideals; it is more attractive to try reach in the unachievable independence, than to downlplay science into service.