&gt;As a citizen, you have already paid for the funding of this research...<p>If you&#x27;re really poor, then as a citizen, you probably haven&#x27;t.  This is a spot where wealth inequality, copyright and culture collide interestingly.<p>If you are poor a movie or book costs a much larger percentage of your disposable income than someone who is rich. As a society we kind of do have to answer the question of whether poverty should exclude people from culture (or science  in this case). So it does become a moral justification. I support the moral right of the starving to steal from the well fed, and count it a moral failing of the well fed that there are permitted to be starving while they luxuriate in their wealth.