I give it a little more credence than that; my main point being that there are way too many boundary conditions on economic systems to get very reliable predictions from a model.
But the interesting thing is that people make a living on just the search for the 5 quark.
I personally know some people that were engaged in this search - it certainly wasn't the focus of their career - now that it looks fruitless, they're moving on to other things. Had they actually found it, would you think it was a waste of time? For every great success, there's a multitude of failures, but without the permission to search, there wouldn't be any success, either.
We are unthanked, forgotten and called "practical" only decades after we've died.
I appreciate what mathematicians do. There wouldn't be physics without math, there wouldn't be chemistry without physics, there wouldn't be biology without chemistry. I know that. You do make a good point that those furthest removed from the finished point of discovery are often "unsung heroes", but as you pointed out, science is a collaborative process (both horizontally and vertically). All deserve credit along the line, IMO.
No, what you describe is "expectation".
Couldn't it be said I have an "expectation" of the scientific method to work? I wouldn't call it faith, because I acknowledge the scientific method is not infallible (neither is my car or a recipe for buffalo wings, for that matter...)
I say: yes. You argue practicality. Fine. What practical value do you have with that? Any time machines been built yet?
The whole world is looking for the cure for cancer, but they don't even have an effective treatment for psoriasis. Sometimes "practical" is in the eye of the beholder.