What's a viable alternative to distribute research funding? I don't think we should return to the day of gentleman scientists who fund their own research during their leisure time.

We should give funding by scientific merit, not for PR stunts and fashion hypes like String theory.

Most of the funding is a scam. Governments announce funding, people relabel their work to fit the funding requirements to get money. Next wave of funding is announced, researches relabel the same work to get into the new funding.

Looks like the issue is that Goodhart's Law is at play here, and there's no infallible algorithm for determining scientific merit.