Current Academic Pursuits & Departmental Context

Sidney Madison Prescott is a Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE) graduate student in the Philosophy Department at Georgia State University, a nationally recognized department known for its strengths in applied ethics, political philosophy, social philosophy, and public-facing scholarship.

The department is widely respected for its interdisciplinary rigor, strong placement record, and sustained engagement with real-world ethical and policy questions. Sidney’s academic work is grounded in philosophy of technology and public ethics, with a developing research trajectory focused on justice at beginnings, autonomy, and moral agency in technologically mediated societies.

Prospective Research Agenda (AI, Digital Companions & Emotional Intelligence)

Sidney’s prospective research agenda, to be pursued collaboratively with academic researchers and subject matter experts, centers on artificial intelligence–driven digital companions and agents and their implications for self-image, emotional intelligence, and human self-understanding.

Planned areas of inquiry include the ethical and clinical relevance of AI-curated outputs derived from user self-reported emotional states, with a focus on how such insights might be responsibly structured, interpreted, and shared with practitioners in ways that support care without undermining autonomy or self-determination.

This line of inquiry is directly informed by the design and development of MIRROR | MIRROR, a human-centric AI platform conceived as a real-world case study for exploring emotionally aware digital companions, reflective self-reporting, and the relationship between self-image and agency.

Rather than treating AI systems as diagnostic authorities, this research framework examines how AI-mediated emotional data can function as interpretive, user-governed artifacts that preserve individual agency while offering clinically meaningful signals within appropriate ethical and epistemic boundaries.

Computational Linguistics, Psychological States & Ethical AI Architecture

Additional planned work aims to examine computational linguistics as it relates to the identification of psychological states such as depression, anxiety, and PTSD, with careful attention to epistemic limits, bias, and the risks of overreach or over-medicalization.

Across these areas, Sidney’s long-term scholarly goal is to contribute to the development of human-centric, proactive ethical AI architectures that translate normative commitments around autonomy, dignity, and care into concrete system design principles.

Teaching, Pedagogy & Instructional Engagement in Philosophy

Alongside this developing research trajectory, Sidney serves as a Supplemental Instructor for philosophy and critical thinking courses, working weekly with faculty and academic staff on lesson planning, quizzes, and instructional design, and leading in-person SI sessions that support undergraduate students’ analytical reasoning, conceptual clarity, and philosophical literacy.

This pedagogical work informs and reinforces her research interests by grounding abstract ethical inquiry in sustained engagement with students and institutional learning environments.

Justice at Beginnings (Long-Term Research on State Intervention, Parental Licensing & Family Ethics)

A parallel and foundational line of inquiry concerns justice at beginnings, extending independent research initiated during Sidney’s Honors College thesis, The Cerebus: Parental Licensing and the Equalization of Opportunity.

This work examines the ethical boundaries of state intervention in the private sphere of the family, with particular attention to child maltreatment, parental authority, and the moral justification of parental licensing frameworks.

Sidney intends to continue and deepen this research through their master’s program and a future PhD, with the goal of developing a comprehensive theory of justice that addresses early-life inequality, the protection of children’s fundamental interests, and the ethical trade-offs inherent in policies aimed at the equalization of opportunity.

This long-term project seeks to articulate a philosophically rigorous account of how societies might responsibly intervene at the earliest stages of human development while respecting autonomy, dignity, and the complex moral terrain of family life.