A researcher who uses good scientific process and conclusively rules out a hypothesis should not lose reputation or income. The article assumes a goal oriented review where the experiment is judged to have “failed” if the results are negative. If the review is process oriented the experiment can be judged successful if the process was conclusive even if the results were negative.

On the topic of funding; individual researchers cannot be expected to bear the long term risk for producing a commercial product from a radical breakthrough. Inventions that are based on improvements to existing products have a supporting technical infrastructure to create a market ready product. Radical breakthroughs, by definition, stand alone in the market and will need years of supporting development to become a commercial product.

In my opinion the cost of research should never be decoupled from the benefit from the results. This means research is funded by organizations with deep pockets and long term outlooks. It also means that the researchers will have “hired to invent” contracts which leave the intellectual property owned by the organization. The managers in control of the money will, of course, still be goal oriented but the researchers can focus on process. In a just world researchers with good results will still benefit from the commercial success of his work.