Reply #27: I'd say (b)

[caraher]

Fusion has been a magic bullet for energy for as long as I've been aware of the need to ditch fossil fuels (30-35 years). During that time, practical fusion has always been forecast to be about 30 years away. If something starts to look genuinely feasible the money will appear (and let's face it, existing conventional fusion research already does get money that's tiny compared to disasters like the Iraq war, but lavish compared to most scientific research).

If some fusion research paths are underfunded, I think Bussard himself is partially to blame. By his account, when he helped start the big-science fusion programs in the '70s they oversold it and padded the budget with the notion of diverting the fat into smaller, parallel projects. Now, my advisor used to say that it didn't matter whether you spent grant funds doing what you promised, so long as what you do instead gets you famous. I don't think that applies anymore when budget figures are several billion dollars as opposed to maybe a few million, whether or not it's true for small-scale research.

Ethical science requires a certain honesty between researchers and their sponsors. I don't think this has been consistently present through the years in fusion research, both in the "big science" and less conventional projects. The sad part is that years of overpromising and underdelivering have built a "credibility gap" that will probably delay introduction of a working power plant.