Comment by jltsiren

The Manhattan Project was successful, because there was a real pressure to get groundbreaking results quickly. Similar pressures don't exist in the academia or the industry in normal times. If a company fails, the worst case is generally bounded by the value of the company. People are not that motivated to get results, because the alternative is probably no worse than bankruptcy. There is no looming threat of slavery or death for employees, shareholders, and their friends and family.

Covid vaccines were a recent example of similar pressures. The academia and the big pharma – the establishment – managed to create many effective vaccines in a record time, because people had real reasons to achieve something.