this isn't conceptually different from picking up someone's safe and finding its lock combination, then claiming the safe's contents for the sake of science.
Except these safes are publicly reachable unlike private safes inside houses. Consider yourself a security team member working on security issues, your payment is in puzzle addresses, find a hole and grab your payment, if the designer was a professional programmer, he wouldn't have made this puzzle, he is a good scientist but not a good programmer, as early bitcoin clients were full of bugs/code related issues, but the concept was perfect and it is to this day. Scientists act based on science, puzzle hunters act based on monetary incentive.
"They asked someone, imagine you are in the middle of the ocean and sharks are approaching, what will you do?"
"He said I will climb a tree"
-They said but there are no trees in the middle of the ocean-
"He said I know, but I don't have any other choice"
🤣