Kind: captions
Language: en
hardship will show you who your real
friends are that's for sure you read the
quote once more don't eat with people
you wouldn't starve
with the following is a conversation
with Andrew huberman his fifth time on
the podcast he is the host of The
huberman Lab podcast and is an amazing
scientist teacher human being and
someone I'm grateful to be able to call
a close friend
also he has a book coming out next year
that you should pre-order now called
protocols an operating manual for the
human body this is Alex frean podcast to
support it please check out our sponsors
in the description and now dear friends
here's Andrew
huberman you think there's ever going to
be a day when you walk away from
podcasting definitely I mean I came up
within and then on the periphery of
skateboard culture and for the record I
was not a great skateboarder I always
have to say that cuz skateboarders are
Relentless if you call something you
didn't do or whatever I mean I could do
a few things and I loved the community
and I still have a lot of friends in
that Community Jim feibo at Deluxe you
can look him up he's kind of The Man
Behind the whole scene I know
Tony Hawk Danny Way all these guys I got
to see them come up and get big and stay
big in many cases start huge companies
like Dan Danny and Colin MCAS are
DC some people have a long life and
something some don't but one thing I
observed and learned a lot from in
skateboarding at the level of observing
the skateboarders and then the ones that
started companies and then what I also
observed in science and still observe is
you do it for a while you do it at the
highest possible level for you and then
at some point you pivot and you start
supporting the young talent coming in in
fact the greatest scientists people like
Richard Axel kathern dulock they many
other labs in Neuroscience Carl daer off
they're not just known for doing great
science they're known for mentoring some
of the best scientists that then go on
to start their own labs and I think in
podcasting I am very fortunate I got in
in a fairly early wave not the earliest
wave but thanks to your suggestion of
doing a podcast fairly early wave and
I'll continue to go as as long as it
feels right and I feel like I'm doing
good in the world and providing good but
I'm already starting to scout Talent my
company that I started with Rob Moore
scyon media there's a couple other guys
in there too Mike playback our
photographer Ian
Mackey Chris Ray Martin
fobes we are a company that produces
podcasts right now that's hubman Lab
podcast but we're launching a new
podcast perform with Dr Andy Galpin nice
and we want to do more of that kind of
thing finding a really great talent
highly qualified people credential
people and I've got a new um kind of
obsession with scouring the internet
looking for the young talent in science
in health and related fields and so will
there be a final episode of the
hlp yeah I mean bullet Buster cancer
aside you know someday I'll they'll be
the very last and thank you for your
interest in science and I'll clip out
yeah I love the idea of walking away and
be dramatic about it right when it feels
right you can leave and you can come
back whenever the fuck you want right uh
John Stewart did this well with the
Daily Show I think that was during the
2016 election when everybody wanted him
to stay on and he just walked away Dave
Chappelle for different reasons walked
away disappeared came back gave away so
much money didn't care and then came
back and was doing like stand up in the
park in the middle of
nowhere genius you have khabib who who
undefeated walks away at the very top of
of a sport is he coming back no at least
we don't know yeah right you don't know
I don't know if you know bears
everywhere are
worthed yeah I think you know it's um
it's always a call you know you the last
few years have been tremendous growth we
launched in January 2021 and even this
last year 2024 has been huge growth you
know in all sorts of ways it's been wild
and we have some some short form content
planned 30 minute shorter episodes that
really distill down the critical
elements we're also thinking about
moving to other venues besides
podcasting so there's always the thought
and the discussion but when it comes to
like when to hang up your cleats you
know it's like there just comes a
natural time where you can do more to
Mentor the Next Generation coming in
than focusing on self and so there will
come a time for that and I think it's
critical I mean again I saw this in
skateboarding like Danny and Colin and
Danny's brother Damon started DC with
Ken Block the driver who unfortunately
passed away a little while ago rally car
driver and they eventually sold it I
think to Quicksilver or something like
that but they're all phenomenal talents
in their respective areas but they
brought in the next you know the next
line of amazing Riders the plan B thing
you know Paul Rodriguez for
skateboarders they know who this is now
in science there are scientists like
Fineman for instance I don't know if
anyone can name one of his mentor
Offspring so there are scientists who
are
phenomenal like Beyond world class right
multigenerational world class who don't
make good mentors I'm not saying he
wasn't a good Mentor but that's not what
he's known for and then there are
scientists who are known for being
excellent scientists and and great
mentors and I think there's no higher um
celebration to be had at the end of
one's career if you can look back and
like hey I put some really important
knowledge into the world people made use
of that knowledge and guess what you
spawned all these
other scientific Offspring or sport
Offspring or podcast Offspring I mean in
some ways we look to Rogan and to some
of the other earlier podcasts is like
they you know they paved the way Ronda
Patrick first science podcast out there
so you know it eventually the baton
passes but fortunately right now
everybody's active and it and it feels
really good yeah well you're talking
about the healthy way to do it but
there's
also uh a different kind of way where
you have uh somebody like uh gisha
gregori Pearlman the mathematician who
refused to accept the fields medal so
he's one of the greatest living
mathematicians and he just walked away
from mathematics and rejected the fields
medal what did he do after he left
mathematics life private 100% I respect
that he's become essentially a recluse
is these photos of him looking very
broke like he could use the money he he
turned away the money he turned away
everything you know there's there
there's you just have to listen to the
inner voice you have to listen to
yourself and make the decisions that
don't make any sense for the rest of the
world and make sense to you I mean Bob
Dylan didn't show up to pick up his
Nobel Peace Prize that's Punk yeah yeah
he probably grew in notoriety for that
maybe just doesn't like going in Sweden
but seemed like it would be a fun trip I
I think they do it in a nice time of
year but hey that's his right he earned
that right I think the best artists
aren't doing it for the prize they
aren't doing it for the fame or the
money they're doing it because they love
the art yeah that's the the Rick Rubin
thing you got to verb it through
download your inner thing I don't think
we've talked about this that this
Obsession that I have about how Rick has
this way of being very very still in his
body but keeping his mind very active
um as a practice went spent some time
with him in Italy last June and uh we
would tread water in his pool in the
morning and listen to history of rock
and roll and 100 songs um amazing
podcast by the way it is yeah and um and
then he would spend a fair amount of
time during the day you know in this
kind of meditative state where his mind
is very active body very still and then
Carl diero when he came on my podcast
talked about how he forces himself to
sit still and thinking complete
sentences late at night after his kids
go to sleep and you know there's a state
of mind rapid eye movement sleep where
your body is completely paralyzed and
the mind is extremely active and people
credit rapid eye movement sleep with
some of the more elaborate emotion
filled dreams and the source of many
ideas and there are other examples
Einstein people described him as taking
walks around the Princeton campus then
pausing and would ask him what was going
on and the the idea that his mind was
continuing to churn forward at a high
rate
um so you know this is far from
controlled studies but we're talking
about some incredible minds and
creatives who have a practice of steing
the body while keeping the Mind
deliberately very active very similar to
Rapid ey movement sleep and then there
are a lot of people who also report you
know great ideas coming to them in the
shower while running so it can be the
opposite as well where the body is very
active and the and the mind is perhaps
more on kind of like a default mode
network not really focusing on anyone
specific thing you know interesting as
uh there's a bunch of physicists and
mathematicians I've talked to they talk
about sleep deprivation and going crazy
hours through the night obsessively
pursuing a thing and then the solution
to the problem comes when they finally
get rest right and and we know we just
did this six episode Special series on
sleep with Matt Walker we
know that when you deprive yourself of
sleep and then you get sleep you get a
rebound in rap and eye movement sleep
you get a higher percentage of rapid eye
movement sleep and Matt talks about this
in the podcast and he did an episode on
sleep and uh creativity sleep in memory
and Rapid ey movement sleep comes up
multiple times in that series um there's
also some very interesting stuff about
cannabis withdrawal and Rapid ey
movement sleep people are coming off
cannabis often will suffer from uh
insomnia but when they finally do start
sleeping they like dream like crazy um
cannabis is a very controversial topic
right now oh yeah I saw that what
happened there's a bunch of drama around
uh episode you did on cannabis yeah we
did a episode about cannabis talked
about the health benefits and the
potential risks right it's it's neither
here nor there um depends on the person
depends on the age depends on genetic
background a number of other things um
we
that episode well over a year ago and it
had no issues online so to speak and
then a clip of it was put to X where you
know the real action occurs as you know
your favorite spot um yeah the the the 4
oce gloves as opposed to the 16 oce
gloves um that is X versus Instagram or
YouTube there was um kind of an
immediate dog pile from a few people in
the cannabis research field the phds and
MDS yeah there were people on our side
there were people not on our side I mean
you know the the statement that got
things riled up the most was this notion
that uh for certain
individuals there's a high potential for
inducing psychosis with high THC
containing cannabis for certain
individuals not all um that sparked some
issues um there
was really a split you know you see this
in different fields it there was one
person in particular Who Came Out
Swinging with language that in my
opinion is not like of the sort that you
would use at a university uh venue um
especially among colleagues but that's
fine you know we're all grownup well for
me from my perspective it was uh
strangely rude and it had an air of like
elitism
that to to me uh was at the source of
the problem during covid that led to the
distrust of Science and the the the
popularization of disrespecting science
because so many scientists spoke with an
arrogance and a douche baggery that I
wish we would have a little bit less of
yeah it's tough because most academics
don't understand that people outside the
university system are um they don't
they're not familiar with like the inner
workings of science and um and the
culture and so you have to be very
careful how you present when you're a
university Professor um and when yeah so
you know he came out swinging at some
you know four-letter word type language
and he was obviously upset about so I
simply said what I would say anywhere
which was hey look come on the podcast
let's chat and um why don't you give
your tell me where I'm wrong and let's
discuss and and fortunately he agreed
and initially he said well no how can I
be sure you're not going to misrepresent
me and so I said we got on a d DM then
then an email then eventually phone call
and just said Hey listen like you're
welcome to record the whole conversation
we've never done a gotcha on my podcast
and let's just get to the heart of the
matter I think this this little
controversy is perfect um kindling for
for a really great discussion and um and
he had some other conditions that we
worked out and and I and I felt like
cool like he's really interested you get
a very different person on the phone
than you do on Twitter I will say he's
been very collegial and that
conversation is on the schedule I said
we'll fly you out we'll put you up he
said no he wants to fly himself he
really wants to make sure that there's
like kind of a space between um I think
some of the perception of science and
health podcast in the academic Community
is that it's all designed to sell
something no we run ads so it can be
free to everyone else yeah but I think
look in the end um he agreed and I'm
excited for the conversation it was
interesting because in the wake of that
exchange there's been a bunch of press
from traditional press about cannabis
has now surpassed alcohol in many in
many um cultures as uh within the United
States as when I say cultures I mean
demographics uh the United States as the
as the drug of choice um there have been
people highlighting the issues of
potential psychosis in high THC
containing and so it's kind of
interesting to see how traditional media
is sort of onboard certain elements that
you know put forward and I think there's
some controversy as to whether or not
the different strains the indicas and
sativas have are biologically different
Etc so we'll get down into the weeds pun
intended during that one and I'm excited
it's the first time that we've responded
to a direct criticism online about um
scientific content in a way that really
promoted like oh here the idea of
inviting a particular guest and so it's
great let's get a guest who um is expert
in cannabis I I believe I could be wrong
about this but he's a behavioral
neuroscientist is slightly different
training but look he seems highly
credential it' be fun and we you know we
welcome that kind of exchange I I'm not
being diplomatic I'm just saying like
it's cool like he's coming on you know
and he was friendly on the phone right
like he literally came out online and
was like basically like kind of like f
you like F this and F you but you get
someone on the phone it's like hey how's
it going and they're like oh yeah well
you know I there was an immediate
apology of like Hey listen I came out
normally I'm like not like that but
online you know you got a different yeah
okay listen so it's a little bit like
it's a little bit like Jiu-Jitsu right
people say all sorts of things I guess
but if they if you're like all right
well let's go then it's probably a
different story you know it's not like
jiu-ju cuz in Jiu-Jitsu people don't
talk shit CU they know what the
consequences are let me let me just say
on mic and off mic you have been very
respectful towards this person uh and
I'm look up to you and respect you and
admire the fact that you have been that
said to me that guy was being a dick and
when you graciously politely invited him
on the podcast he was still talking down
to you the whole time so I really admire
and look forward to listening to you
talk to him but I hope others don't do
that like you are a positive humble
voice exploring all the interesting
aspects of science like you want to
learn if there you've got anything wrong
you want to learn about it the way he
was being a dick I was just hurt a
little bit not because of him but CU
like there's some people I really really
admire brilliant scientists that are not
their best selves on Twitter on X
definitely I don't understand what
happens to their brain well they regress
they they regress and and they also are
protected you know you know when you
remove the I mean no scientific argument
should ever come to physical blows right
but when you remove the real world thing
of being right in front of somebody yeah
um people will throw all sorts of stones
at a distance you know over a wall and
they've got their their wife or their
husband or their boyfriend or their dog
or their cat to go cuddle with them
afterwards um but you get in a room and
it's like you know
confrontational people in real life are
are pretty rare but hopefully if they do
it they're like willing to back it up
with knowledge in this case right we're
not talking about physical altercation
yeah he he kept coming and he kept
putting on conditions how do I know you
you want this and I was like well you
record the conversation how do I know
you want that listen we'll pay for you
to come out how do you know and
eventually he just kind of relented and
um and it to his credit you know he's
agreed to come on I mean he still has to
show up but once he does you know we'll
treat him right like we would any other
guest yeah you treat people really well
and I I just hope that people are a
little bit nicer on the internet yeah
well you know X is an interesting one
because you it thickens your skin you
know to just to go on there I mean you
have to be ready to deal with sure but I
can still criticize people for for being
douchebags because like that's still not
good inspiring Behavior like especially
for
scientists that should be sort of
symbols of uh scientific thinking which
requires intellectual humility humility
is a big part of that and Twitter is a
good place to illustrate that yeah yeah
years ago I used to I was a student in
ta then um instructor and then directed
A Cold Spring Harbor course on visual
Neuroscience these are summer courses
that um explore different topics and at
night we would host um what we hoped
were battles in front of the students um
where you'd get two people on a you know
would it be neural Prosthetics or
molecular tools that would first you
know um restore Vision to the blind kind
of arguments you kind of like it's kind
of a silly argument because it's going
to be a combination of both right but
you'd get these great arguments but the
arguments were always couched in data
and occasionally you'd get somebody
would go like or would curse or
something but it was the rare very um
very well-placed you know um insult it
wasn't you know Coming Out Swinging um I
think ultimately you know Twitter's a
record of people's behavior the the
internet is a record of people's
behavior and here I'm not talking about
news reports about people's behavior I'm
talking about how people show up online
is really important you've always um
carried yourself with a ton of composure
and respect and you know you just you
would hope that people would grow from
that example well I'll tell you that the
the podcasters that I'm scouting it's
their energy but it's also how they
treat other people how they respond to
comments and um you know we're blessed
to have pretty significant reach when we
put out a podcast like of someone else's
podcast it goes far and wide so H like a
skateboard team like a laboratory where
you're selecting people to be in your
lab you're you want to pick people that
you would enjoy working with and that
are
collegial etiquette and etiquette is is
lacking nowadays but you're in the suit
and tie you're bringing it back bringing
it back uh you said that your
conversation with James Hollis a young
psychoanalyst had a big impact on you
what do you mean James Hollis is a
84-year-old yion psychoanalyst who's
written 17 books including under Saturn
Shadow which is on the healing and
Trauma of men the eating Eden Project
excuse me which is about relationships
and creating a life I discovered James
hollison an online lecture that was
recorded I think in San Diego it's on
YouTube the audio is terrible called
creating a life and this was somewhere
in the 2011 to 2015 span I can't
remember and I was on my way to Europe
and I called my girlfriend at the time I
like I just found the most incredible
lecture I've ever heard and I he talks
about the shadow he talks
about your developmental upbringing and
how you either align with or go 180
degrees off your parents Tendencies and
values in certain areas he talked about
the specific questions to ask of oneself
at different stages of Life to Live a
full life so it's always been a dream of
mine to meet him and to record a podcast
and he wasn't able to travel so our team
went out to DC and sat down with him we
rarely do that nowadays people come to
our studio and he came in he had some
surgeries recently and he kind of came
in with some assistance from a you know
a cane and then sat down and just just
blew my mind it from start to finish he
didn't miss a syllable and every
sentence that he spoke was like a
quotable sentence of with real potency
and actionable items I think one of the
things that was most striking to me was
how he said when we take ourselves out
of stimulus and
response and we just force ourselves to
spend some time in the quiet of our
thoughts while walking or while seated
or while lying down doesn't have to be
meditation but it could be that we
access our unconscious mind in ways that
reveals to us who we really are and what
we really want and that if we do that
practice repeatedly 10 minutes a day
here 15 minutes a day there that we
start to really touch into our unique
gifts and the things that make us each
us and the directions we need to take
but that so often we just stay in
stimulus response we just do do do do do
which is great we have to be productive
um but we miss those um important
messages and interestingly he also put
forward this idea of what is it it's
like get up shut up suit up yeah
something like that like get out of bed
suit up and shut up and get to work he
also has that in him kind of a goggin
type mindset so be able to turn off all
this self-reflection and self analysis
and just get shit done get shit done but
then also take dedicated time and stop
and just let stuff geyser to the surface
from the unconscious mind and he quotes
Shakespeare and he quotes Yung and he
quotes everybody through history with
with Incredible accuracy and um and in
exactly the way uh needed to drive home
a point but that that conversation to me
was one that I really felt like okay you
know if I don't wake up tomorrow for
whatever reason that one's in the can
and I feel really great about it it's it
to me it's the most important um guest
recording we've ever done
um in particular because he has wisdom
and while I hope he lives to be
204 chances are he's got another what 20
30 years with us hopefully more but I
really really wanted to capture that
information and get it out there so I'm
very very proud of that one um uh and
he's the kind of guy that anyone listens
to him young old male female whatever
and you're going to get something of
value what do you think about this
idea of the
shadow that uh the good and the bad that
we repress that hides from Plain Sight
when we analyze ourselves that's there
you think there's like a ocean that we
we don't have direct access to yes yeah
young said it we have all things inside
of us and we do and some people are more
touch with those than others and some
people it's repressed I mean does that
mean that we could all be you know
horrible people or marvelous people um
benevolent people perhaps I think that
um thankfully more often than not people
lean away from the like violent and um
harmful parts of their their Shadow but
I think spending time thinking about you
know
one's shadow shadow knows is super
important how how else are we going to
grow otherwise you know we have these
unconscious blind spots of of denial or
um repression or whatever you know the
psychiatrist tell us but yeah it clearly
exists within all of us I mean we have
neural circuits for rage we all do we
have neural circuits for altruism um and
no one's born without these things and
some people they're atrophied and some
people they're hypertrophied but I
looking Inward and and recognizing
what's there is key or positive things
like creativity maybe that's what Rick
Rubin is accessing when he goes silent
silent body active mind mhm that's
interesting what is it for you what
place do you go to that generates ideas
that helps you generate ideas I have a
lot of new practices around this I mean
I'm all always exploring for protocols I
have to it's like in my nature um when
when I went and spent time with Rick I I
tried to adopt his practice of staying
very still and just letting stuff you
know come to the surface or the daoan
way of formuling complete sentences in
while being still in the body what I
have found works better is what my good
friend Tim Armstrong does to write music
he writes music every day he's a music
producer he's obviously singer guitar
player for rancid um and he's helped
dozens and dozens and dozens of female
pop artists and punk rock artists
write great songs and many of the famous
songs that you've heard from other
artists Tim helped them right Tim wakes
up sometimes in the middle of the night
and what he does is he'll start drawing
or painting so what he's done and Joanie
Mitchell talks about this too you find
some creative
Outlet that's like 15 degrees off center
from your main creative outlet and you
do that thing so for me that's drawing I
like doing anatomical drawings
neuroscience-based drawing draw neurons
that kind of thing and if I do that for
a little while in my mind starts
churning on the the nervous system and
biology and then I come up
with areas I'd like to explore for the
podcast ways I'd like to address certain
topics right now I'm very interested in
autonomic control a beautiful paper came
out that shows that anyone can learn to
control their pupil sizes and without
changing luminance through a bio
feedback mechanism uh and that gives
them Auto control over their so-called
automatic autonomic nervous system and
I've been looking at what the circuitry
is and it's it's beautiful so I'll draw
the circuitry that we know underlies
autonomic function and as I'm doing that
I'm thinking oh like what about
autonomic control and those people that
supposedly can control their pupil size
then you go in and there's a paper
published in nature press one of the
nature journals and there's a recent
paper on this like oh cool and then we
talk about this and then how could this
be put into kind of a post or how could
this you know so doing things that are
about 15° off center from your main
thing is a great way to access I believe
the circuits for in Tim's case painting
goes to
songwriting I think for Joanie Mitchell
that was also the case right I think it
was drawing and painting to singing and
songwriting for Rick I don't know what
it is maybe it's listening to podcast I
don't know that that's his business do
you have anything that you like to focus
on that allows you then an easier
transition into your main creative work
no I'd really like to focus on emptiness
and silence so I pick the dragon I have
to slay so whatever the problem I have
to work on and I just sit
there and stare at it I love how fucking
linear you are and it just and if
there's no if you're tired I'll just sit
I believe in the in the power of just
waiting and usually I'll stop being
tired or there energy rises from
somewhere or an idea Pops from somewhere
but there needs to be a silence and an
emptiness it's an empty room just me and
the dragon and we wait that's it like if
it's a usually with programming you're
thinking about a particular design like
how do I design this
thing to solve this problem any
cognitive enhancers I've got a quite the
gallery in front of me oh that's right
yeah should we walk through this yeah
this is not this is not a a sales thing
this just um I tend to do this bounce
back and forth your refrigerator just
happen to have a lot of different
choices so water this is all my
refrigerator I know right there's no
food in there there's water there's
element which they now have canned and
yes they're a podcast sponsor for both
of us but that's not why I cracked one
of these open I like them provide
they're they're cold and that's by the
way my least Flav favorite flavors I was
saying that's that's the reason it's
still left in the fridge the Cherry one
is really good the black cherry there's
a orange one yeah I pushed the um sled
this morning and pulled the sled for my
workout at the gym and and it was hot
today here in Austin so um some salt is
good and then matin yate zero sugar full
confession I help develop this I'm a
partial owner but I love yate half
Argentine been drinking mate since I was
a little kid there's actually a photo
somewhere on the internet when I'm like
three sting on my grandfather's lap
sipping mate out the gourd and then this
you might find interesting this is just
a little bit of
coffee with a scoop of Brian Johnson
gave me cocoa just like pure unsweetened
Coco so I put that in chocolate I like
it just for the taste well actually
nukes my appetite and since I'm we're
not going out to dinner tonight until
later I figure that's good yeah Brian's
an interesting one right he's really
pushing this this thing the optimization
of everything yeah although he just hurt
his ankle he posted a photo that he hurt
his ankle so now he's injecting bpc body
protection compound 157 which many many
people are taking by the way I did an
episode on peptides I should just say
you know bpc 157 one of the known
effects in animal models is angiogenesis
like development of new vasculature
which can be great in some context but
also if you have a tumor you don't
really want to vascularize that tumor
anymore so I worry about people taking
bpc157
continually but um and there's very
little human data I think there's like
one study and it's a lousy one so a lot
of animal data some of the peptides are
interesting however there's one that
I've experimented with a little bit
called pineline which um I find even if
I've just taken it twice a week before
sleep then it times you it seems to do
something to the circadian timekeeping
mechanism because then on other days
when I don't take it I get unbelievably
tired at that time that normally I would
do the injection these are things that
I'll experiment with for a couple weeks
and then typically stop maybe try
something else but I stay out of um
things that really stimulate any of like
major hormone Pathways um when it comes
to peptides that's actually a really
good question of how do you experiment
like how long do you try a thing to
figure out if it works for you well I'm
very sensitive to these things so I and
I been doing a lot of things for a long
time so if I add something in it's
always one thing at a time and I notice
right away if it does not make me feel
good like there's a lot of excitement
about some of the so-called growth
hormone
secretagogues hyperoral and tesamorelin
Calin um I've experimented a little bit
with those in the past and they've nuked
my rap and eye movement sleep but given
me a lot of Deep Sleep which doesn't
feel good to me but other people like
them I also just generally try and avoid
taking peptide that tap into these
hormone Pathways because you can run
into all sorts of issues but some people
take them safely but usually after about
four five days I know if I like
something or I don't and then I move on
but I am not super adventurous with
these things I know people that will
take cocktails of peptides with multiple
things they'll try anything that's not
me and I do blood work um but also I'm
you know I'm mainly reading papers and
podcasting and um I'm teaching a course
next spring Stanford I'm gonna do a big
undergraduate course um so I'm trying to
develop that course and things like that
so um I don't need to lift more weight
or run further than I already do which
is not that much weight or or far as it
is right you're not going to the
Olympics you're not trying to truly
maximize some aspect of your performance
no and I'm not and I'm not trying to get
down below whatever you know 7% body fat
or something I I don't have those kinds
of goals so hydration electrolytes
caffeine in the form of mate and then
this coffee thing and then and then
here's one that I think I brought out
for discussion this is a piece of
Nicorette they're not a sponsor um
nicotine is an interesting compound it
will raise blood pressure and it
um is probably not safe for everybody
but you know the nicotine is gaining in
popularity like crazy mainly these um
pouches that people put in the lip not
we're not talking about um smoking
vaping tipping or snuffing you know my
interest in nicotine started this was in
2010 10 I was visiting Columbia Medical
School and I was in the office of the
Great neurobiologist Richard Axel won
the Nobel Prize co-recipient with Linda
Buck for the um discovery of the
molecular basis of old faction brilliant
guy he's probably in his late 70s now
probably yeah and he kept popping
Nicorette in his mouth and I was like
what's this about and he said oh well
this was just anecdote right but he said
but he said this he said oh well you
know it protects against Parkinson's and
Alzheimer's I said it does he goes yeah
yeah yeah I if he was kidding or not
he's known for making jokes and then he
said that when he used to smoke it
really helped his focus in creativity
but then he quit smoking because he want
lung cancer and he found that he
couldn't focus as well so he would
choose Nicorette so occasionally like
right now we each I do a half a piece
but I'm not Russian so I'm a little you
know you did you just pop the whole
thing in your mouth MH so I'll do a
couple milligrams every now and again
and it definitely sharpens the mind on
an empty stomach in particular but you
fast all day you're still doing one meal
a day meal a day yeah yeah I did uh
nicotine polish with Rogan at dinner and
I got high yeah that's a lot that's like
usually six or eight milligrams I know
people that get a canister of Zen take
One A Day pretty soon they're taking a
canister a day so you have to be very
careful I will only allow myself two
pieces of Nicorette total per week and
you will notice that you know in the day
after you use it you know sometimes your
your throat will feel a little bit like
like a little spasm you like you might
want to cough once or twice and so you
know if you're a singer or you're
podcaster or something you have to do
long podcast you want to just be mindful
of it but yeah you're supposed to kind
like keep it in your cheek and here we
go but it did make me intensely focus in
a way that was a little bit scary cuz
the nucleus balis is in the you know
basil 4brain nucleus has col energic
neurons that radiate out axons little
wires that release acetylcholine into
the neocortex and elsewhere and when you
focus on one particular topic matter or
one particular area of your visual field
or listening to something and focusing
visually we know that there's a an
elaboration of the amount of
acetylcholine released there and it
binds to nicotinic acetylcholine
receptor sites there so it's a kind of
intentional modulation um by
acetycholine so you're getting an with
nicotine you're getting a exogenous or
artificial heightening of that circuitry
and uh the time I had T Carlson on the
podcast he told me that apparently it uh
helps him as he said publicly uh keep
his uh love life vibrant really it
causes visas of constrictions like he
literally said it makes his dick very
hard he said that publicly also okay
well as little as I want to think about
Tucker Carlson's um sex life um no
disrespect uh
the major effect of nicotine on the
vascul my understanding is that it
causes Vaso constriction not Vaso
dilation drugs like Calis tadalfil
viagara ETA vasod dilators they allow
more blood flow um nicotine does the
opposite less blood flow to the
periphery but provided dosages are kept
low and I I don't recommend people use
it frequently or at all and I don't
recommend young people use it you know
um you know 25 and younger brain's very
plastic at that time
and um and certainly smoking dipping
vaping and snuffing aren't good because
you're going to run into you run into
trouble uh for other reasons but in any
case um well and even there vaping is a
controversial
topic probably safer than smoking but
has its own issues and I said something
like that and boy did I catch a lot of
heat for that you can't say anything as
a health science educator not piss
somebody off you know it just depends on
where the the center of mass is and how
far outside that you are for me the
caffeine is the main
thing and actually it's it's a really
big part of my life and one of the
things you recommend that people wait a
bit in the morning to consume caffeine
if they experience a crash in the
afternoon this is one of the
misconceptions I um I regret maybe even
discussing it for people that crash in
the
afternoon often times if they delay
their caffeine by 60 and 90 minutes in
the morning they will offset some of
that but if you eat a lunch that's too
big or you didn't sleep well the night
before you're not going to avoid that
afternoon crash but I'll wake up
sometimes and go straight to hydration
and caffeine especially if I'm going to
work out here's a weird one if I
exercise
before 8:30 a.m. especially if I start
exercising when I'm a little bit tired I
get energy that lasts all day if I wait
until my peak of energy which is midm
morning 10:00 a.m. 11:00 a.m. and I
start exercising then I'm basically
exhausted all afternoon and I don't
understand why I mean it depends on the
intensity of the workout but so I like
to be done
showered and heading into work by 9:00
a.m. but I don't always meet that Mark
so you're saying it doesn't affect your
energy if you start out with exercising
I think you can get energy and wake
yourself up with exercise if you start
early and it and then that fuels you all
day long I think that if you wait until
you're feeling at your best to
Train sometimes that's mental because
then in the afternoon when you're doing
like the work we get paid for like
research podcasting Etc then often times
you know your your brain isn't firing as
well that's interesting I haven't really
rigorously tried that wake up and just
start running or this is the Joo thing
and then there's this phenomenon called
entrainment where if you force yourself
to exercise or eat or socialize or view
bright light at a certain time of day
for three to seven days in a row pretty
soon there's an anticipatory circuit
that gets generated this is why anyone
in theory can become a morning person to
some degree or another and this is also
a beautiful example of why you wake up
before your alarm clock goes off you
know people wake up and all of a sudden
it goes off it wasn't because it clicked
it's because you have this in incredible
timekeeping mechanism that exists in
sleep and there's some papers that have
been published in the last couple of
years Nature Neuroscience and elsewhere
showing that people can answer math
problems in their sleep simple math
problem but math problems
nonetheless this does not mean that if
you ask your partner a question and
sleep that they're going to answer
accurately like they might screw up the
whole um uh cumulative probability of
20% across multiple months all right
listen what happened what happened
here's the deal a few years back I did a
four and a half hour after editing four
and a half hour episode on male and
female
fertility um the entire recording took
11 hours
and at one point during the and and by
the way I'm very proud of that episode
there's many couples have written to me
and said they now have children as a
consequence of that episode and my first
question is what were you doing during
the episode but in all seriousness um we
should say that it's 4 and a half hours
yeah and for people and they should
listen to the episode you're it's
extremely technical episode like you're
non-stop dropping facts and and
referencing huge number of papers it's
must be exhausted I don't understand how
you can possi talk about sperm Health
spermatogenesis it talks about the
ovulatory cycle it talks about things
people can do that are that are
considered absolutely supported by
science it talks about some of the
things kind of out on the edge a little
bit that are a little bit more
experimental it talks about IVF it talks
about ixie it talks about um all of that
it talks about frequency of pregnancy as
a function of age
Etc um but there's this one portion
there in the podcast where I'm talking
about the uh probability of a successful
pregnancy as a function of age and so
there was a clip that was cut in which I
was describing cumulative probability
and by the way we published cumulative
probability histograms in many of my
Laboratories papers including one that
was a nature article in 2018 so we run
these all the time and yes I know the
difference between independent and
cumulative probability just like I do um
the way the clip was cut and what I
stated unfortunately combined to a like
a pretty great Gaff where I say you just
adding I said you're just adding
percentages 20 20 20 to 120% and then I
made us kind of unfortunately my humor
isn't always so good and I made a joke I
said um 120% but that's a different
thing alog together what I should have
said was um that's impossible you know
and here here's how it actually works
but then the the it continues where I
then describe the cumulative probability
histogram for um successful pregnancy
but somewhere in the early portion I I
misstated something right I made a math
error um which implied I didn't
understand the difference between
independent and cumulative probability
which I do and it got picked up and and
run and people had a really good laugh
with that one at my expense and so what
I did in response to it was rather than
just say everything I just said now I
said
I just came out online and said hey
folks in an episode dated this on
fertility I made a math error here is
the formula for cumulative probability
successful pregnancy at that age here's
the graph here's the you know and I I
offered it as a teaching moment in two
ways one for people to understand
cumulative probability it was sort of
interesting too a number of people that
had come out critiquing the Gaff also um
like bology and folks came out pointing
out that they didn't understand
cumulative probability there was a lot
of posturing you know the dog pile
oftentimes people are quick to dog pile
they didn't understand but a lot of
people did understand some smart people
out there obviously I called my dad and
he was just laughing he goes oh this is
good this is like the old school way of
of hammering academics um but the point
being there's a teaching moment um gave
me an opportunity to say hey I made a
mistake I also made a mistake in another
podcast where I um did a micron to
millimeter conversion and or centimeter
conversion but and we always always
correct these in the show note captions
we correct them in the audio now um
unfortunately on YouTube it's harder to
correct you can't go and edit and
segments so we put in the captions but
that was the one teaching moment if you
make a mistake it's substantive and
relate to data you you you apologize and
correct the mistake use a teaching
moment the other one was to say Hey you
know in all the thousands of hours of
content we've put out I'm sure I've made
some small errors I think I once said
serotonin when I me dopamine and you
know you're you're going you're you're
riffing and it's it's a reminder to be
careful um to edit double check but the
internet usually uh edits for us and
then we go make corrections but it
didn't feel good at first but ultimately
you know I can laugh at myself about it
um long ago at Berkeley when I was teing
my first class it was a biopsychology
class be 1998 or 1999 um I was drawing
the pituitary gland which is you know it
has an anterior and a posterior lobe
actually is a medial lobe too I have
five 600 students in that lecture hall
and I drew a chalkboard and I drew the
two loaves of the pituitary and I said
my back was to the audience I said you
know and so they just sort of hang there
and everyone just erupted in laughter
cuz it looked like a scrotum with two
testicles and I remember thinking like
oh my God like I don't think I can turn
around like and face this you know and
like oh got to turn around sooner or
later so I turned around and we just all
had a big laugh together it was
embarrassing I'll tell you one thing
though they never forgot about the two
loes of the pituitary yeah and you
haven't forgotten about that either
right there's a high high salience for
these kinds of things and it also was
kind of fun to
see how excited people get to see people
trip it's like an elite Sprinter trips
and does something stupid like you know
runs the opposite direction out the
blocks or something like that and and or
a you know I recall that one World Cup
match years ago a guy scored against his
own team I think they killed the guy do
you remember that mhm some South
American or Central American team yeah
and they killed the guy but yeah let's
let's look it up I just said um World
Cup yeah he was gunned down Andre
Escobar yeah scored against his own team
in 1994 World Cup in the United States
just 27 years old playing for the
Columbia national team yeah last name
Escobar it's a good name you think it
would protect you
listen you know so there are some gaffs
that get people uh killed right so you
know how forgiving are we for online
mistakes you know it's it's the nature
of the mistakes people were quite
gracious about the the Gaff and some
weren't and you know it's interesting
that
um
we as you know Public Health Science
Educators um you know we'll do long
podcast sometimes and and you need to be
really careful what's great is AI MH
allows you to check these things now
more readily so that's cool
and there are ways that that it's now
going to be more self-correcting I mean
you know I think there's there's a lot
of errors out there on the internet and
people are finding them and it's cool
like things are getting cleaned up yeah
but mistakes nevertheless will happen
are you uh do you feel the pressure of
not making mistakes sure I mean you know
I try and get things right to the best
of you know to the best of my ability um
I check with experts it's kind of
interesting when people really don't
like something that was said in a
podcast a lot of times I chuckle because
I'm you know at Stanford we have some
amazing scientists but there I talk to
them else people
elsewhere um and it's always interesting
to
me
how you I'll get Divergent
information and then I'll find the
overlap in the VIN diagram and I have
this like question do I just stay with
the overlap in the VIN diagram like I
did an episode on oral health I didn't
know this until I researched that
episode but oral health is critically
related to heart health and brain health
that there's a bacteria that causes
cavities streptococus you know that can
make its way into other parts of the
body through the mouth that um um can
cause serious issues there's the idea
that some forms of dementia some forms
of heart disease are start in the mouth
basically I talked to no fewer than four
dentists Dental experts and there was a
lot of convergence I also learned that
teeth can demineralize that's the
formation of cavities they can also
remineralize as long as a cavity isn't
too deep it can actually fill itself
back in especially if you provide the
right substrates for it that saliva is
this incredible fluid that has all this
capacity to remineralize teeth provided
the meal you is right things like
alcohol-based mouthwashes killing off
some of the critical things you need
this fascinating and I put out that
episode thinking oh I'm not a dentist
I'm not an oral health episode but I
talk to a pediatric dentist there's a
terrific one Dr downcore Stacy St ACI on
Instagram does great content talk to
some others um and like and then I just
waited for the attack I was like here we
go and it didn't come and dentists were
thanking me like you know MH that's a
rare thing more often than not if I do
an episode about say psilocybin or MDMA
you get some people liking it or ADHD
and the drugs for ADHD we did a whole
episode on the riddin viance ater all
stuff you get people saying thank you
you know I prescribe this to my kid and
it really helps and and this and but
they're private about the fact that they
do it because they C so much attack from
other people so I like to find the
center of mass report that try to make
it as clear as possible and then I know
that there's some stuff where I'm going
to catch shit what's frustrating for me
is when like I see claims that I'm like
against fluidization of water which I'm
not right like we talked about the
benefits of fluoride it builds hyper
strong bonds within the teeth I went and
looked at some of the the literally the
crystal struct not excuse me not the
crystal stru structure but the the
essentially the like Micron and
submicron structure of teeth it's like
incredible and a where fluoride can get
in there and form these super strong
bonds and you can also form them with
things like hydroxy appetite and why is
there fluoride in water well it's the
best okay you get you say some things
that are interesting but then somehow it
gets turned into like you're against
fluidization which I'm not or I've be