I've talked to academics who are getting discouraged that they don't see how their approach to AI is going to be possible any more, with so much funding going toward the largest models from industry. On the other hand I've talked to startup founders building AI products whose business is booming because ChatGPT brought so much attention to the entire space.
We are certainly living in interesting times ;-)
If it takes 10 years to get funding on particle physics, generally it doesn't matter "that much" because that part of the science scene moves pretty slowly.
If it takes 10 years to build a billion dollar cluster for AI today, what the hell is the AI world going to look like in 10 years anyway? Building a cluster to study AI ethics might be meaningless because a terminator may be pointing its laser rifle at our head by then telling us to be good little human subjects because Microsoft and OpenAI decided to move fast and break things.
Welcome to how the entire world probably feels, but way worse because they haven't been getting 6-7 figure salaries for the last ten years to insulate themselves for what big tech wants to see happen.
I think it's a positive thing that AI researchers are feeling this way because it might be the only thing that slows things down or at least shows us a little more empathy.
I'm not counting on it, but yeah, all I can say is, get used to it. I'm basically just leaning on trying to enjoy things that aren't in front of me, kind of like being more mindful while we're in free fall, while simultaneous fretting and praying for future generations and hoping they have a future.