DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The CEO of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI said Tuesday that the dangers that keep him awake at night regarding artificial intelligence are the “very subtle societal misalignments” that could make the systems wreak havoc.

Sam Altman, speaking at the World Government Summit in Dubai via a video call, reiterated his call for a body like the International Atomic Energy Agency to be created to oversee AI that’s likely advancing faster than the world expects.

“There’s some things in there that are easy to imagine where things really go wrong. And I’m not that interested in the killer robots walking on the street direction of things going wrong,” Altman said. “I’m much more interested in the very subtle societal misalignments where we just have these systems out in society and through no particular ill intention, things just go horribly wrong.”

However, Altman stressed that the AI industry, like OpenAI, shouldn’t be in the driver’s seat when it comes to making regulations governing the industry.

“We’re still in the stage of a lot of discussion. So there’s you know, everybody in the world is having a conference. Everyone’s got an idea, a policy paper, and that’s OK,” Altman said. “I think we’re still at a time where debate is needed and healthy, but at some point in the next few years, I think we have to move towards an action plan with real buy-in around the world.”

OpenAI, a San Francisco-based artificial intelligence startup, is one of the leaders in the field. Microsoft has invested some $1 billion in OpenAI. The Associated Press has signed a deal with OpenAI for it to access its news archive. Meanwhile, The New York Times has sued OpenAI and Microsoft over the use of its stories without permission to train OpenAI’s chatbots.

OpenAI’s success has made Altman the public face for generative AI’s rapid commercialization — and the fears over what may come from the new technology.

The UAE, an autocratic federation of seven hereditarily ruled sheikhdoms, has signs of that risk. Speech remains tightly controlled. Those restrictions affect the flow of accurate information — the same details AI programs like ChatGPT rely on as machine-learning systems to provide their answers for users.

The Emirates also has the Abu Dhabi firm G42, overseen by the country’s powerful national security adviser. G42 has what experts suggest is the world’s leading Arabic-language artificial intelligence model. The company has faced spying allegations for its ties to a mobile phone app identified as spyware. It has also faced claims it could have gathered genetic material secretly from Americans for the Chinese government.

G42 has said it would cut ties to Chinese suppliers over American concerns. However, the discussion with Altman, moderated by the UAE’s Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence Omar al-Olama, touched on none of the local concerns.

For his part, Altman said he was heartened to see that schools, where teachers feared students would use AI to write papers, now embrace the technology as crucial for the future. But he added that AI remains in its infancy.

“I think the reason is the current technology that we have is like … that very first cellphone with a black-and-white screen,” Altman said. “So give us some time. But I will say I think in a few more years it’ll be much better than it is now. And in a decade it should be pretty remarkable.”

NEW ORLEAN — New Orleans’ Carnival season is nearing its “Fat Tuesday” climax, with the last lavish Mardi Gras parades set to roll through historic neighborhoods while narrow streets of the old French Quarter host a raucous, continuous street party of revelers overflowing its bars and restaurants.

Two of the city’s favorite parades — the processions of Rex, King of Carnival and the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club — were set to roll Tuesday morning on major thoroughfares. Monday night featured the parade of the Krewe of Orpheus, co-founded by home-grown musician and actor Harry Connick Jr. In addition to elaborate floats and marching bands, scheduled participants included Connick himself, actor Neil Patrick Harris and Harris’ husband, David Burtka.

New Orleans has the nation’s largest and best known Carnival celebration. It’s replete with cherished traditions beloved by locals. But it’s also a vital boost to the city’s tourist-driven economy — always evident in the French Quarter.

“No strangers down here,” visitor Renitta Haynes of Chattanooga, Tennessee, said as she watched costumed revelers on Bourbon Street over the weekend. “Everybody is very friendly and approachable. I love that.”

She and her friend Tiffany Collins wore giant purple, green and gold bead necklaces as they sipped drinks.

The annual pre-Lenten festivities aren’t limited to New Orleans. Similar celebrations are held in Louisiana and along the Gulf Coast. Mobile, Alabama, where six parades were scheduled Tuesday, lays claim to the nation’s oldest Mardi Gras celebration. And other lavish Carnival celebrations in Brazil and Europe are world renowned.

Monday’s activities in New Orleans also included an afternoon “Lundi Gras,” or Fat Monday celebration on the Mississippi Riverfront, including live music. Part of the event was the annual ceremonial meeting of the man tapped to be this year’s King of Carnival — chosen by the Rex Organization, a predominantly white group with roots in the 19th century — and the man elected king of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, founded by Black laborers in the early 1900s. The meeting is a custom that began in 1999 in what was seen as a symbol of slowly eroding social and racial barriers.

An unusual special election in New York City’s suburbs on Tuesday could be a bellwether in the fight for control of Congress.

Former U.S. Rep. Tom Suozzi, a Democrat, faces off with Republican Mazi Pilip, a county lawmaker, in a race for a House seat that became vacant when George Santos was expelled from Congress.

The contest, being fought in a district that includes Long Island suburbs and a small corner of Queens, has offered a preview of the political strategies both parties might use in the fall, with the campaigns testing messages on immigration, abortion and public safety. New York is expected to host a handful of congressional battleground races this year and the special election could provide clues on how crucial districts might lean.

Still, forecasting for November could be complicated given that turnout, which was already expected to be low given the abbreviated race, could be further hampered by a storm expected to dump several inches of snow on the district on election day.

The unusual midwinter election became necessary after Santos was ousted by his colleagues in December, partway through his first term. Santos won office in what had been a reliably Democratic district partly by falsely portraying himself as an American success story — a son of working class immigrants who made himself into a wealthy Wall Street dealmaker.

But many elements of Santos’ life story were later exposed as fabrications, and he was indicted on multiple charges, including allegations he stole money from Republican donors. He has pleaded not guilty.

Suozzi, who previously represented the district for three terms, campaigned in the centrist lane, distancing himself from progressive policies that have not played well on Long Island and cast himself as a dealmaker who can work with the GOP.

Republicans sought to link Suozzi to criticism over federal immigration policy under Democratic President Joe Biden, a looming political vulnerability for Democrats because of an ongoing influx of migrants in New York. Democrats have framed the race around abortion rights, a centerpiece of their election year strategy.

Suozzi spent a lot of the campaign talking about the need to strengthen immigration policy. He said he would support a temporary closure of the U.S.-Mexico border to slow the number of migrants into the city, signaling Democrats recognition of the political pressures surrounding the subject.

Pilip was born in Ethiopia but left the country at age 12 as part of Operation Solomon, when Israel airlifted some 14,500 Ethiopian Jews to Israel in less than two days as civil war ravaged the Horn of Africa.

She served in Israel’s military as an adult, moving to the U.S. after marrying a Ukrainian-American doctor in 2005. In 2021, Pilip was elected to the Nassau County legislature.

Though Pilip publicly identifies as a Republican and won county office under the GOP banner, she is actually a registered Democrat. She says she registered as a Democrat when she got to the U.S. but has drifted away from the party as it has become more liberal. A spokesman said Pilip intends to change her party affiliation after the election.

Despite once being a migrant herself, Pilip has hammered Suozzi and Democratic President Joe Biden over U.S. immigration policy. She has argued for additional border policing to stop illegal immigration as well as the construction of a border wall.

Suozzi counterattacked Pilip on abortion, saying she couldn’t be trusted to protect abortion rights in places like New York where it remains legal.

Pilip said she is personally against abortion but wouldn’t force her beliefs others and would oppose any attempt by Congress to impose a nationwide ban. She has also said mifepristone, an abortion medication, should be available nationally.

In their only debate before the election, Suozzi pushed Pilip to further clarify her position on abortion, asking her whether she is “pro-choice.” She did not give a direct answer, instead accusing Democrats of lying about her stance on abortion.

Democrats spent heavily during the campaign to boost Suozzi and retake the district, one of a handful of New York House seats the party wants to flip as part of their plan to win control of Congress in November. Republicans have dominated on Long Island in recent elections.

“They see that, first of all I’m a very strong candidate. My proven record as a county legislator. My own story is very strong,” Pilip said in an interview. “And they are very nervous.”

ATLANTA — Family, friends and military colleagues are gathering in Georgia as funerals begin for three Army Reserve soldiers killed last month in a drone attack on a U.S. base in Jordan.

The first funeral service was scheduled Tuesday morning for Staff Sgt. William Jerome Rivers at a Baptist church in Carrollton, west of Atlanta.

The 46-year-old reservist and Pennsylvania native, who is survived by his wife and son in Georgia, served in uniform for more than a decade after enlisting as an electrician. The Army said his overseas deployments included a nine-month tour in Iraq in 2018. His obituary from a local funeral home called him a warm-hearted family man with a “gentle demeanor and a fierce and determined personality.”

Following the church service, Rivers is to be buried at the Georgia National Cemetery for military veterans in Canton, just northwest of Atlanta.

A Jan. 28 drone strike on a U.S. military outpost in Jordan killed Rivers as well as Sgt. Kennedy Sanders and Sgt. Breonna Moffett, who all received their ranks in posthumous promotions. They were assigned to the Army Reserve’s 926th Engineer Battalion, 926th Engineer Brigade, based at Fort Moore in west Georgia.

President Joe Biden met with the families of the fallen soldiers when their remains were returned to U.S. soil earlier this month at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

Meanwhile, friends, former classmates and co-workers have gathered to remember the slain soldiers while awaiting their final homecoming to Georgia.

In Waycross, where 24-year-old Sanders worked at a pharmacy and helped coach children’s basketball and soccer teams, residents gathered at a downtown park for a moment of silence shortly after the overseas attack. Her funeral is scheduled Saturday at Ware County Middle School.

Arrangements in Savannah were still pending for Moffett, who turned 23 barely a week before she died. Since then, she has been honored with a ceremony at Windsor Forest High School, where she was a drum major and JROTC cadet before graduating in 2019. A candlelight vigil was held by Moffett’s employer, United Cerebral Palsy of Georgia, where she helped teach cooking and other skills to people with disabilities.

The deaths were the first U.S. fatalities blamed on Iran-backed militia groups after months of intensified attacks on American forces in the region since the Israel-Hamas war began in October.

More than 40 troops were also injured in the drone attack at Tower 22, a secretive U.S. military desert outpost that enables U.S. forces to infiltrate and quietly leave Syria.

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Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia.