michael_nielsen

This is true of almost everything I think. Your theoretical best work is different from the work that others care to pay for

Yes. The quote comes from a book Charlton wrote. Your comment applies to much of the book, and I wish he'd address it more directly. People are often careerist for very good reasons (to eat, have shelter etc). The tradeoff between careerism and idealism is difficult to manage.

If there are such people, I must automatically avoid them like poop on the sidewalk.

I've noticed it's relatively uncommon in mathematics. I attribute this to the fact people feel less pressure to get grants. I know physicists who've spent their entire career wanting to work on quantum foundations, for instance, but who do it rarely, since it's "not fundable".

Mathematicians feel less pressure to get grants because there are so few grants to be gotten that it's not a mark of shame not to get many! We earn our living by humbly teaching teenagers calculus; then we think about what we want. A case in point: me.

Unfortunately it is not necessarily the same case in every institution. In some institutions, math is expected to be as productive as other lab sciences in bringing grants and when it doesn't happen (and it doesn't as John explained), we are shamed for not doing so. More than ...

shaming, it affect one's tenure, promotion, and a raise (if there is one).

It's crucial for some politically astute people in the math department to talk to administrators and explain how it's different from the lab sciences. At my university they've done this. It takes work, but it's worth it.

But it simply isn’t true. Every successful scientist I know maintains a portfolio that balances truly speculative punts and “safe” work that brings in a steady stream of incremental results when the punts don’t pay off (which, pretty much by definition, is how most come out).