My son, who was in training to become an EMT, came to me one day concerned that my wife had several small bottles of aromatherapy (potions?, tinctures?) on her desk. He was deeply concerned that "she believed in that stuff" and felt that we needed to stage an intervention. I assured him that I doubted that she believed they had any therapeutic value, but that I would talk to her about it.
Turns out, they were sent by an acquaintance of hers who was sending out free samples to everyone she knew hoping to drum up sales for her business. My wife was going to throw them out, but wanted to look up how to "properly dispose of the contents" and rinse out the bottles before recycling them. I just laughed: dumping the contents down the drain would likely be no different than washing them--other than saving water and time.
The question is actually mis-phrased. When people ask the question "Have you validated...", they are not asking for an absolute answer that guarantees success. They are probing whether you have actually thought deeply about what you are doing, how it will work, how it fits within the market, etc. If you haven't done that and can clearly articulate the answers, then the chances of success are orders of magnitude smaller than they otherwise would be.
The chances of success are still very small. 95%+ of startups fail. But, if you haven't done your homework, then chances of success are virtually nil.
The school receives most of their funding from the state, and the state gets to appoint half of their board. The school is concerned that the state could retaliate against them for allowing the professors to testify. Which is probably illegal, but probably wouldn't be addressed for months or years.
The easy way out of this is for the court to subpoena the professors. I wouldn't be surprised if U of F was taking this stance to force that to occur, and which point they can shrug, and say "we tried, but they were subpoenaed..."
"Obvious only in hindsight" ~= "Obvious only once known"
Neither of those things mean "obvious" (aka "self-evident") the way we usually mean it in colloquial English. Which is why your project requires some refinement in messaging.
I'm not arguing the benefit you claim isn't there, just that your statement about benefits being "numerous and obvious but only in hindsight" is not the selling point you think.