Water Policy

My research interests focus on the complex interactions and feedbacks between social, technological, and ecological systems, which effectively influence water supply, demand, wastewater disposal and reuse, and inequities in the distribution of water resources. I am interested in better understanding how human decision-making, across and between multiple social, political, economic, and legal hierarchies, directly and indirectly affects the urban hydrological cycle at differing temporal scales.

Joel's training is in civil and environmental engineering, with specialization in natural systems for wastewater treatment.  After a stint teaching high school science and math, Joel has returned to school seeking greater understanding of the water resources issues facing the West under the dual pressures of climate change and population growth.  He is particularly intersted in the translation of scientific results for application by decision makers.  Joel's present reserach seeks to describe the effects of Mountain Pine Beetle infestation on mountain catchments, where the much of the West's water falls as snow. 

I came to the University of Arizona in the Fall of 2009.  I have a BA in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where I wrote my senior honors thesis under Harry Brighouse on the implications of global climate change for individual rights.  I have also worked as a researcher for Iridian Asset Management, LLC., focusing in part on emerging technologies in the energy industry. 

I currently work in environmental philosophy, with a strong inclination towards interdisciplinary research.  My research interests involve on a number of different subjects:

• The psychological mechanisms underlying environmental concern, the evolutionary functions of those mechanisms, and the potential challenges for environmental ethics in the exaptation of these mechanisms for their new roles in our moral psychology.
• The roles of romantic, not-all-things-considered viewpoints in our moral psychology and in our all-things-considered ethical positions.
• The relationship between Hayekian market liberalism and environmentalist arguments for protecting or preserving natural systems due to their instrumental importance and complexity.
• The history of thought regarding natural resource scarcity, fragility, and complexity.
• Virtue-ethical approaches to thinking about collective responsibility

As one might expect, I am not nearly an expert on all of these areas.  But if you are interested in thinking about some of these issues (or don't know what they mean), I would love to hear from you!