Was Feynman right when he said “If you give more money to theoretical physics, it doesn’t do any good if it just increases the number of guys following the comet head”?

This essay was originally published in 2013 on https://www.quora.com [Note added in response to comment: I am responding here to Feynman's suggestion in the second half of the quote that the *only* way to make progress is to encourage…