[mrpsbrk]

Another way to say the same thing the article says is that «science has been rewarding creativity less and less». In that case, both (a) and (b) start to seem subtly related. Because once your hero ceases being a random wacko who was curious about weird stuff and comes to be a laborious researcher that climbed a lot of ladders, then the amount of effort you give to weird ideas decreases.

Another way to put it is that big science is replacing science, and i think it is. (Feyerabend's perspectives, albeit very different from that, seem to point out many of the problems...)