[boomboomsubban]

>The history of flight spans back 2000 years

And at some point we stopped trying to make fake birds wings to flap our way to flight, as our understanding grew to the point where we knew it was incredibly unlikely to work.

Yes, basic research is necessary and developments sometimes take a long time. That doesn't mean you should keep following a route that repeatedly leads to a dead end. And every hypothesis isn't equally deserving of funding.