Ally Peabody Smith

Ally Peabody Smith is an Assistant Professor at Lehigh University's College of Health, Department of Population Health. As a philosopher and mixed-methods researcher, her work bridges ethics, philosophy of disability, bioethics, and moral theory.

Her research focuses on four interconnected areas: (1) moral status, (2) capacity and communication, (3) bio- and neuroethics, and (4) emotional/political contexts of disability. She explores how ethical theory can address questions about disability and how disability challenges foundational ethical and political concepts.

• Develops "relationship-constituted and constituting meaningful expressions" for non-speaking entities
• Works on advocacy, political representation, and Master Narratives of intellectual disability
• Examines virtue ethics in medical education with collaborator Dr. Ian Peebles
• Conducts empirical projects on physician attitudes toward disabled patients
• Investigates consciousness definitions in AI/organoid policy

She co-developed UCLA's ethics curriculum for medical students and teaches courses like Research Ethics in PopH and Philosophy of Medicine. Her NIH-funded study on intracranial research ethics and NSF grant under review for organoid intelligence highlight her commitment to applied ethics.