It’s telling that your examples are theoretical physics, math, and computer science. You should visit a lab that does actual experiments. I don’t think anyone

It’s telling that your examples are theoretical physics, math, and computer science. You should visit a lab that does actual experiments. I don’t think anyone is doing cryo electron microscopy in their spare time. Most science just takes a lot of time and money. No way around it. Also, most research is incremental, and thats’s totally fine. People lionize the “great men” like Einstein who have these earth-shattering discoveries, but those aren’t really worth anything without the decades of exploration and hundreds of scientists testing theories and figuring out their consequences and implications.