Yes, I think the funding is the key. There are already funders who see it as their mission to support scientists and allow them to tackle interesting questions.

Yes, I think the funding is the key. There are already funders who see it as their mission to support scientists and allow them to tackle interesting questions. But in the end, they have a limited pot of money to dish out, and they have to somehow make a decision about what's worth funding. That brings us back to spending a lot of time writing grant applications and trying to justify the work. Ultimately, 'gentleman scientists' were probably able to follow their interests because they were rich enough that they didn't need to worry about earning a daily wage. That's still possible, but we'd much rather let science be done by anyone who's interested and good at it. The OP mentions Microryza, their crowdfunding platform for science. That's a very interesting approach, but I think it only works if you already have some kind of paid job in science: the projects I've looked at are all asking for much less than a year's salary for one person.