The pursuit of knowledge is not a linear path. The reason you benefit from deep learning now is because a few people in the past believed neural networks had a future despite not working as well as other techniques such as SVMs.
Discovering knowledge and using the knowledge that works best are very different.
Your argument remind me from this lecture from Feynman. Quoting him: "...and every theoretical physicist that is any good knows 6 or 7 different theoretical representations for exactly the same physics and knows that they are equivalent... but he keeps them in his head hoping that they'll give him different ideas for guessing."
Discovering knowledge and using the knowledge that works best are very different.
Your argument remind me from this lecture from Feynman. Quoting him: "...and every theoretical physicist that is any good knows 6 or 7 different theoretical representations for exactly the same physics and knows that they are equivalent... but he keeps them in his head hoping that they'll give him different ideas for guessing."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NM-zWTU7X-k