Sustain What?

Most of you already know I’ve been writing and performing songs for 30 years, mostly hidden behind my journalism. Only a few of my tunes cross directly over into my “beat” - and none more so than “Liberated Carbon,” which I wrote as the United States invasion of Iraq played out in the early 00’s and which I included on my first album, A Very Fine Line, in 2013.
I’d first touched on how oil access delineates areas of global interest and conflict in 1991, as I explored yesterday:
But I thought it worth posting the annotated lyrics to my song as the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz and American, Israeli and Iranian salvos continue, and the oil (and gas) impacts of this new Middle East war move to the foreground. Do check the footnotes!
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LIBERATED CARBON
music and lyrics © 2013 Andrew Revkin
It took a thousand generations for our species to rise.But gathering and hunting was no way to get by.We yearned to burn more than dung and sticks.Then someone came along and said, “Hey, try lighting this.”He opened up the ground and showed us coal and oil.He said, “Come liberate some carbon. It’ll make your blood boil.”Liberated carbon, it’ll spin your wheels.Liberated carbon it’ll nuke your meals.Liberated carbon, it’ll turn your night to day.Come on and liberate some carbon, babe, it’s the American way.Now I got peat swamp fossils running my TV.BP’s black label burns in my S.U.V.We can light up the planet like a Christmas tree.They say that things are getting hot but, hey, we’ve got A.C.Liberated carbon, it’ll spin your wheels.Liberated carbon it’ll nuke your meals.Liberated carbon, it’ll turn your night to day.Come on and liberate some carbon, babe, it’s the American way.Pump those electrons and that gasoline.No sweat or hurry, just turn on a machine.We sent an army to the desert to keep this country free,And to liberate some carbon, baby, for you and me…Liberated carbon it’ll spin your wheels.Liberated carbon, it’ll nuke your meals.Liberated carbon, it’ll turn your night to day.Come on and liberate some carbon, babe, it’s the American way.
There are various performances online, including with John Munson, the bass player from the Minneapolist band Semisonic, at the 2018 National Geographic Explorers Festival, and with melting ice chunks onstage at a Play for the Planet event in San Francisco.
To support my music side, you can buy my album, A Very Fine Line, on Bandcamp or buy Liberated Carbon as a single.
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There’s a lot going on.
For me, at least, one vital counterpoint is music — writing it, performing it, and convening with musician friends to talk about it. (If you happen to be in Downeast Maine this Thursday, March 5, come hear my first effort at an event in which I talk and sing about my interrelated life tracks in journalism and songwriting.)
Today, I want to introduce you to a dear old musical friend, Vince Bell. I hope you’ll listen to our conversation and his music above (recorded a few days ago), and on his vincebell.com website. He’s just dropped a wonderful song from his second spoken-word album (words spoken over marvelous music from a spectacular ensemble he convened in 2024 in Brooklyn, N.Y.). The song and album are “Break My Heart”:
Vince’s roots are well worth understanding. Here he was singing his song “The Sun, Moon and Stars” back in 1977, having emerged from Houston to join a remarkable cohort of Texas bards including Lyle Lovett and Nanci Griffith. Here’s Griffith’s interpretation of the song.
In December 1982, just as he was getting into high gear and recording his first album, his life and musical journey were derailed by a near-death encounter with a drunk driver in Austin.
He suffered brain damage and the near amputation of one arm. It took him a decade of grinding effort to rebuild his ability to sing and pick guitar. In 2009, he wrote “One Man’s Music,” a touching and sometimes-amusing memoir of his journey back to health and creativity.
I can’t recall my first meetup with Vince, but it was in New York City in the mid 1990s when he was beginning to tour in support of his 1994 album “Phoenix.” The name of this collection of spellbinding songs reflected his physical and professional ressurection. I consider it one of my “desert island” records. Here’s “Mirror, Mirror”:
We became friends and I’ve had the utter pleasure of backing him up on mandolin or guitar in some shows in the New York Region.
“Is it hot enough for you, yet?”
I’ve also visited him a couple of times in his Santa Fe home and got a chance to play slide guitar in this take on his great song about pollution - “Local Charm”:
For a Dot Earth post way back in my New York Times days, he explained its origins:
Vince says: “Local Charm was a joint in the old Harrisburg part of Houston down by the ship channel. I lived there for a few years among the railroad tracks and the rust. The imageries in this piece were my backyard.” An excerpt:
Miles and miles of twisted trash,railroad tracks in all directions.Whining ‘dozers climb like antsin holes they can’t get out of.Above the filth so wide and deeppyrites spire before the sun.Where water taps as clear as glassbefore it gets to here.Is it hot enough for ya, yet?
Beyond his music and wordsmithing, Vince is an absolute paragon not just of resilience, but of dogged determination to squeeze the joy and creativity out of whatever life brings his way.
I sense that’s a pretty rare quality.
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Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live Sustain What show on Team Trump’s effort to demolish a foundational finding by the Environmental Protection Agency - that heat-trapping greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare.
My guests were:
* Jonathan Adler, a William and Mary Law School professor and commentator with a libertarian orientation who’s deeply dug in at the intersection of law and federal climate policy. Read his analysis of Trump’s endangerment strategy:
* The Dangers of Pursuing the Endangerment Finding
* Why Trying to Undo the Endangerment Finding Is A High-Risk (and Low-Reward) Deregulatory Strategy
* Jean Chemnick, a longtime climate journalist at E&E News/ Politico. Read her excellent coverage.
* Sean H. Donahue, a longtime environmental lawyer representing the Environmental Defense Fund in the litigation that has begun over the endangerment action.
Donahue and Adler differ on some points but strongly agreed that the Trump administration, perhaps in trying to rush to put the question swiftly to the Supreme Court, may be its own undoing - chasing what Adler calls the “white whale” for zealots opposing climate action. Beware what you seek. I made a piece of art to illustrate the point:
Here’s a nugget from Adler in which he explains the flaw in a strategy trying to undercut EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases by saying the science points to less severe risks:
I used Google’s AI to generate this summary of key points:
Jonathan Adler highlights the legal difficulties and potential strategic missteps of the Trump administration’s approach to revoking the endangerment finding (7:10-7:46). Adler also emphasizes that the motivation behind this strategy appears to be political rather than based on sound climate policy or scientific arguments (7:52-8:19). He points out that the auto industry, a key regulated sector, hasn’t expressed significant concerns about the endangerment finding itself (10:08-10:17).
Jean Chemnik discusses the origins of the push to overturn the endangerment finding, tracing it back to individuals within the Bush administration and later at organizations like the Heritage Foundation (11:19-13:58). Chemnik also notes the symbolic importance of the endangerment finding for those who deny climate change as a serious problem (9:05-9:15).
Sean Donahue asserts that the administration’s strategy is ill-advised from a legal standpoint, lacking sound justification in law or the existing record (15:16-15:26). Donahue points out the strong legal precedents, including Supreme Court decisions, that uphold the endangerment finding and greenhouse gas regulation (18:47-19:58). He also touches on the political implications, suggesting that if this repeal holds up, it could lead to significant demand for new climate policies at state, local, and federal levels (1:00:14-1:00:58).
Thanks for watching the show and sharing it!
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Boy this conversation with End of Science author John Horgan and transhumanism fan Steve Fuller was fun, given how dark some of our conclusions were. Read the pre-show post to get a lot of relevant links and background:
Precautionary versus “proactionary” strategies for managing the present with the future in mind
Fuller said it’s important to let go of many of our worries about how present actions related to science and technology might affect future generations. “We get very hyped up about future generations,” he said. He added:
I think we need to imagine when we think about future generations that their baseline about what counts as a good life will be whatever they’re born into. So in other words, they will not be thinking like us, just like we’re not thinking like Aristotle….
But there is an issue here about how you face the uncertainty of the future. And this gets to the business of the precautionary principle versus what I’ve proposed — the proactionary principle.
These are two different attitudes toward risk, right? And the precautionary principle, you could trace it back to the Hippocratic Oath. Above all, cause no harm, right?
So it’s a harm avoidance approach to risk because you treat uncertainty under those conditions as potential threat. So you set very high standards with regard to regulation for new technologies, stuff like that.
The European Union actually has a version of the precautionary principle built into its environmental regulations.
The other is the thing that is associated with transhumanism, and that is the proactionary principle. And the pro-actionary principle treats risk as an opportunity.
So in other words, you treat it as like a fair throw of the dice almost. You adopt the attitude kind of the way entrepreneurs do.
When they see a sort of uncertain situation, they’re going to make something out of it. And this idea then leads to a much more open sense of what the future can be.
I mused on the reality that there’s little sign among the current world’s great powers — big tech firms, the oligarch class, superpowers — that regulation can be meaningfully applied.
Horgan, long largely a techno-optimist, wrapped up our chat with this uplifting thought:
And I’ve just concluded over the last five years, and it’s just been growing on me lately, that humanity doesn’t really give a s**t about understanding, illumination. It is always all been about power with the quest for truth as kind of marketing and window dressing. My view of the future of science and even of civilization is quite dark right now.
There is much, much more. Please listen to the full show if you can and post reactions. I’ll drop the paywall, although I would love it if a few more of you decide to chip in to help me keep this Sustain What project going.
Please consider becoming a financial supporter of Sustain What:

Insert, Feb. 19 - Via Googl AI, here’s a summary:
* Introduction to the Guests and Discussion Themes (0:44-2:25)
* Andrew Revkin introduces his long-time friends and intellectual sparring partners, John Horgan and Steve Fuller.
* The core topics of discussion are set: artificial intelligence (or synthetic/simulated intelligence), the “end of truth,” and the current state of our information environment.
* Steve Fuller’s Background and Approach to Knowledge (2:38-5:04)
* Steve Fuller explains his academic background in the history and philosophy of science.
* He describes his focus on the social and political dimensions of science, particularly how technology and changing political economies influence the production and evaluation of knowledge.
* The Impact of Social Media on Knowledge and Power (5:09-7:00)
* The discussion shifts to how social media has drastically altered the dissemination of knowledge and the dynamics of power, especially in politics.
* Steve Fuller highlights Andrew Breitbart and Steve Bannon as pioneers in using social media to channel information for ideological purposes, leading to a fragmented epistemic landscape.
* John Horgan’s “End of Science” Revisited (10:56-12:05)
* John Horgan reflects on his book The End of Science, suggesting that major scientific breakthroughs aimed at understanding the world (like relativity, quantum mechanics, and evolutionary theory) are largely behind us.
* He expresses a dark view of the future of science and civilization, concluding that humanity primarily seeks power rather than truth or illumination.
* AI: Horror vs. Positive Potential (15:13-17:03)
* John Horgan admits his horror at AI, viewing it as bringing out his “Luddite” tendencies, despite his love for other technologies like his MacBook and iPhone.
* He contrasts this with Steve Fuller’s more positive outlook on AI, particularly its potential to utilize vast amounts of scientific material that currently goes unused.
* The “Replication Crisis” and AI’s Role in Science (27:00-27:51)
* Steve Fuller attributes the “replication crisis” in science to narrow and competitive research frontiers, where pressure to be first leads to cutting corners.
* He suggests that a broader distribution of scientific effort would reduce incentives for fraud.
* The Future of Wikipedia in the Age of Generative AI (28:08-29:00)
* Steve Fuller predicts that generative AI will put Wikipedia out of business because AI can provide customized, Wikipedia-style answers more efficiently.
* He views Wikipedia as “old-fashioned crowdsourcing” that is laborious and prone to disputes.
* Science as Faith and the “Conservation of Ignorance” (1:16:14-1:19:00)
* The host plays a clip of Pete Seeger discussing his father’s view that scientists have the “most dangerous religious belief” – the idea that an infinite increase in empirical information is inherently good.
* John Horgan challenges this, noting that science, unlike religious faith, has materially altered the world through technologies like the hydrogen bomb.
* The “Conspiracy Mentality” and Endless Data Seeking (1:19:00-1:20:05)
* Steve Fuller connects Pete Seeger’s critique to the “conspiracy mentality”, where people constantly seek more information, believing something is being hidden.
* He argues that science, when working correctly, engages in “self-limitation” through method and tests, drawing lines rather than seeking data endlessly.

And do share this post with friends concerned about the future and the present state of science.
Thank you Larry Hogue, Jeanne Manion, Karen Malpede, Eleanor Margulis, and many others for tuning into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit revkin.substack.com/subscribe

I just had a truly helpful - and dare I say hopeful - pop-up conversation with Columbia University’s Gernot Wagner - a top-notch climate policy and economics analyst - on what to think and work on as the Trump Administration carries out its long-pledged plan to repeal the 2009 “Endangerment Finding” by the Environmental Protection Agency under President Obama.
Quick points:
* The litigation over this Trump move (details are still to come later this week) will play out for many years.
* There’ll be lots of CO2 released inside the Beltway as anti-regulation zealots pop Champagne corks, but decarbonization trends will be sustained globally.
* In the meantime, Wagner points to substantial areas of Trump policy that align completely with past Democratic policies - on geothermal, nuclear energy, energy storage (and, yes, carbon capture). Read this post by Wagner and colleagues.
* We discussed how the huge surge in AI infrastructure investment is coming with a surge in solar/battery systems (yes and gas). Read his recent post with colleagues: “The Race to Power Data Centers.”
Endangering “Endangerment”
As the EPA website explains, the Endangerment Finding is the formal scientific determination that greenhouse gases—specifically carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, and sulfur hexafluoride—threaten public health and welfare. The finding established the legal basis for regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.
The Wall Street Journal was fed the exclusive by the administration in a story with on-record comments from the EPA admnistrator and Secretary of the Interior.
The New York Times published a revealing deep dive focused on four key figures who’ve been working for 15 years or more to get to this moment. One is the lawyer Mandy Gunasekara, who helped Senator James Inhofe toss his snowball in the Senate in 2015 (seated behind him).
One reality of course, as Cardiff University’s Aaron Thierry quipped on Bluesky, is that “You can repeal an endangerment finding. You can’t repeal the endangerment.”
To me, it’s vital to keep a focus - amid all the destruction and backsliding - on what can be sustained or even advanced around clean energy choices even as the fight over regulation rolls on, enriching new generations of environmental lawyers.
Wagner’s Columbia-based Climate Knowledge Initiative is one place to look for insights. Here’s that post I mentioned above: America’s Clean Energy Transition Will Continue Despite the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Listen to Wagner here if you can’t watch the whole show right now:
If you like what I’m doing here, do consider chipping in a bit as a paying supporter.
Sustain What is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Thank you Sarah Lazarovic, David Gelber, and many others for tuning into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit revkin.substack.com/subscribe