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Hi everyone,
My name is Kyle Doherty, and I thrilled to join the Effective Altruism forum. I have been lurking here for a few weeks, but wanted to wait for the new open thread to introduce myself. A few quick things about my background are that I grew up in Massachusetts, I got my bachelor's in psychology before earning my master's in sustainable international development. Since then I have not quite found a satisfying career path for a variety of reasons. Recenty I have decided to study more about AI safety and ethics but I will touch on that more later in this introduction.
I am not quite sure when exactly I first heard of effective altruism, but it was during my time in graduate school. My introduction to the ideas was mostly from 80,000 Hours, which remains one of my favorite resources. I did not dive too deeply into either the content or the community on the first go-around, but a lot of what I did read spoke to me. The reason effective altruism mostly fell to the wayside was because 2023, 2024, and the first half of 2025 were a time of huge change and upheaval in my life. A litany of life-changing events made me focus on other things before my life became much more settled earlier this year. When I finally found the space to dive back in, I was amazed by how everything clicked for me even more.
A big reason for my recent return to the effective altruism space, is wanting to find a career that is meaningful and fun to me. While I am not 100% certain of the exact path it will take me, I have been most interested in topics surrounding AI safety and ethics. While working as a contractor for an AI company, I became increasingly concerned about various parts in the development of AI models. I also became quite alarmed (and amazed) by the incredible speed at which the capabilities of AI was expanding. These realizations are what pushed me towards deciding to dig deeper into AI safety and ethics.
I am looking forward to learning more from all the wonderful people here. Please let me know if you have any questions or comments and I will try my best to respond. I would also love to hear from anyone who wants to chat about AI, nuclear threats, or any other issues. I have been enjoying learning a lot recently and would love to have more people to chat with.