All science is materialistic

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Don’t discount serendipity. Investigations that never achieve their intended goals frequently lead to spin-off technologies.

For the record, your use of the phrase ‘they will likely be fewer and fewer over time’ make you sound like a futurist crank.

Boru

That is not how futurism is defined:

2) a point of view that finds meaning or fulfillment in the future rather than in the past or present

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/futurism

And, so, I am not a futurist.

By that definition, neither was Clarke. But, by the primary definition of futurist, you both are:

 one who studies and predicts the future, especially on the basis of current trends

Boru