Imagine a scenario where a reporter rounds up your exes and asks them to dish the dirt.
What would they say about you?
The one with the messy break up. What choice words would they have?
Now imagine waking up to find it all laid bare in print in one of the world’s biggest news magazines and shared online to their 2.6 million website users, 2.2 million Instagram followers and 1.7 million Twitter/X followers.
That’s the unenviable experience Dr Andrew Huberman, a 48-year-old tenured professor in the Department of Neurobiology at Stanford School of Medicine, had this week when New York magazine ran a cover feature with the headline “Andrew Huberman’s Mechanisms of Control” and the subhead “The private and public seductions of the world’s biggest pop neuroscientist”.
You imagine that, upon seeing the magazine’s cover, Huberman’s blood must have run as cold as the water in the ice bath protocols he regularly recommends on his chart-topping health optimisation podcast, the Huberman Lab.
And you know what, he should be under the microscope. He should be held to account. But not necessarily for the things to which the vast majority of the 8,000-word deep dive into his private life is devoted.
Huberman on trial
We’ll get to what Huberman should be scrutinised for in in a minute, but first let’s look at the New York magazine feature.
It focuses heavily on Huberman’s personal life and, in particular, his relationships with women. It details allegations from multiple exes who claim they were deceived and emotionally manipulated by him and that, at one point, he was dating five women simultaneously.
As is the way with modern media, the story soon took on a life of its own. And, as the headline act in a line-up of “rockstar” scientists who’ve recently found fame by delivering insights on complex subjects in digestible formats, it didn’t take long for other outlets to pick up on the piece.
Self-styled “high-end tabloid” The Daily Beast was one of the first major publications to sink their teeth into it, closely followed by The Sun, sucking up some SEO juice with the headline “Who is Andrew Huberman and does he have a girlfriend?”
With the story topping the Entertainment trend chart on Twitter/X, other health and fitness influencers muscled in with their hot takes, some starting with the (admirably honest if nothing else) admission that they’d neither read the story nor listened to Huberman’s podcasts.
He even landed himself a conspiracy theory cameo. “They don’t like Huberman because he’s part of the renaissance that is teaching people, especially men, how to be strong and self-sufficient and healthy” said one user on X. Always “they” isn’t it? Whoever they are.
Body of evidence
One of Huberman’s most vocal critics is the cognitive anthropologist Chris Kavanagh. He hosts a podcast called Decoding The Gurus, which recently devoted a two-hour episode to examining the validity of a 20-minute segment from a Huberman Lab podcast on the scientific evidence for the benefits of grounding (a therapeutic technique that focuses on realigning your “electrical energy” by reconnecting to the earth).
“Huberman does not come out of this looking like a normal person,” was Kavanagh’s comment on the New York magazine story.
You could, on the other hand, say he comes out of it looking all too normal. The story shatters the myth of optimised perfection and reveals the reality of flawed humanity.
The real question is, should the story have been published in the first place? That rests on whether Huberman has been hypocritical or deceptive. The case for says he is an expert who dispenses advice on how to live optimally and his subject remit extends to relationships.
The fact he released a podcast episode titled “Dr Becky Kennedy: Protocols for Excellent Parenting & Improving Relationships of All Kinds” a few weeks ago doesn’t help his cause.
The case against says that he is a scientist who focuses on health and wellness optimisation and when he does cover relationships, he’s platforming an expert in that field and inviting them to share their advice rather than claiming to be the embodiment of the ideal partner.
Lab rat
We didn’t set up Unfiltered to judge the private lives of scientists. We did, however, commit to scrutinising the advice they share, so that’s what we’re going to focus our energy on.
The essential criticism of Huberman’s podcast advice is that he will say something is supported by research but not go into detail about the strength of that research and that he sometimes uses non-human data to make prescriptive recommendations.
“Huberman is a really good example of someone who sounds ‘sciencey’ but is just pulling everyone’s leg,” said nutrition research scientist Dr Alan Flanagan in a recent interview with Unfiltered.
“If you look at the science that’s supposed to be supporting his claims it’s a random rodent study or it’s a speculative mechanistic study. It’s not robust but when he’s saying [things like] you get a 2,000% increase in dopamine from something, everyone says, ‘Whoa! I want more dopamine’, so I guess it sounds sensationalist.
“I cannot believe for a second that he doesn’t realise he’s misrepresenting the quality or speculative levels of research into prescriptive behaviours you should do. I can’t believe that’s anything but deliberate.”
Flanagan isn’t the only expert to voice concerns over the way Huberman interprets data. “A two-minute cold immersion to the neck, and five 30-second cold showers per week led to a significant reduction in abdominal fat and waist circumference in the men in this study” wrote Huberman last year while linking to a PubMed paper.
Epidemiologist Gideon Meyerwitz-Katz dug around to find the data from that study. “I would say this is a straightforwardly null trial, showing no benefit between cold exposure and none,” he said.
“You’ve got someone who is a tenured scientist at an institution like Stanford,” says Flanagan. “So, to my mind, he either knows the information he puts out is speculative or experimental science or not very well supported. Or, he’s not quite aware because he speaks to a lot of different areas of science and he wouldn’t have specific expertise or knowledge in all of those areas. Or he’s just not aware of the context of that field and he’s putting it out anyway. It’s reckless and we can be clear about why it is being done – the commercial success of the podcast.”
Does that mean you should no longer listen to the Huberman Lab? No, it doesn’t. But it is a reminder that these experts are people, not gods or gurus.
So don’t take everything at face value. Understand when someone might have a financial incentive to say something sensational. And be quietly grateful your personal life isn’t plastered over the cover of a magazine.
4 Comments
Paul
How is your article any different from the other articles trying to profit from Huberman’s drama.
As the saying goes “When the camel falls the knives come out.”
Your timing of addressing Huberman’s interpretation of research at a time when he is trending as a hot topic on multiple platforms says a lot about your intentions and your mercenary mentality.
I like your publication and am not a Huberman apologist, I’m just calling out the hypocrisy that’s possibly sitting in your own blindspot.
Jon Lipsey
Hello Paul. Thanks for the comment. It’s a good question, and it’s a pitfall we need to be aware of when we cover a subject like this. Andrew Huberman is in the field of health and performance optimisation, which is more or less Unfiltered’s remit so what he does and says is relevant to us and our audience. We have worked directly with experts, such as Andy Galpin, who have collaborated closely with Huberman, and we’ve interviewed a number of people who have appeared as guests on his podcast. We didn’t examine or repeat the allegations made against Huberman in our story other than to clarify to readers what had happened. But we have said that the real scrutiny should focus on the way he interprets studies and shares advice, which is why we’ve quoted the nutrition researcher Dr Alan Flanagan, who we spoke to a few months ago. This story draws attention to Flanagan’s opinions, which are relevant to our audience and to anyone who listens to Huberman’s podcast. We understandably want our content and contribution to reach the widest possible audience so adding something to this discussion is a natural way to do that. The publications I ribbed in our story haven’t, in my view, tried to contribute to the discussion. And the social media takes offered by people who confess to have neither read the story or listened to the podcast provide a snapshot of the state of contemporary media. I also appreciate you saying that you like Unfiltered and that you wrote your comment in a way that opens a discussion!
Paul
Thanks Jon for your thoughtful response.
May I draw your attention to the email heading that greeted me in my inbox?
“What would your exes say about you?”
That doesn’t seem to focus on Huberman’s approach to science but focuses sharply on Huberman’s alleged transgressions in his personal life.
The clickbait headline in my inbox seems to indicate that in this particular instance, you’re seeking to capitalise on Huberman’s current situation rather than his general approach to science.
I’m all for debating his approach, I just question your timing for doing so, while pointing the finger at others who are doing similarly to boost their readership and rankings at Huberman’s expense.
When we point the finger at others, 3 fingers are pointing back at us.
I look forward to reading great content from you that stands on its merit, rather than reading what might come across as Schaudenfraude.
Jon Lipsey
Hi Paul. Your first comment asked how our article was different to others on the subject so I responded to that.
I think the email subject is a separate question so I’ll share my thoughts on that too. The email is directing you this story and the story is one that aims to positively contribute to the discussion and the awareness around quality of information offered by pop science figures. The subject line of the email relates to the first line of the story. The first few paragraphs of the story have been written to capture the attention of the reader in a way that connects the situation to their own lives, starts to tell a story and invites them to paint a picture in their heads. That imaginary picture is then transposed onto a real-world scenario, which is designed to recognise the humanity of the situation – one that involves a person who has found themselves in an, as I say in the story, “unenviable” situation. The story moves from that to the basic details, then to observations about the coverage and finally to criticisms of Huberman’s interpretation of data.
I wouldn’t personally characterise the story as capitalising on Huberman’s current situation. I’d say it was a normal way to increase awareness of ideas and criticisms other contributor’s to Unfiltered have previously voiced and I think it is reasonable for us to want to draw attention to that. I’d also dispute the claim of Schaudenfraude because I don’t detect any in what that I’ve written. I’d say that inviting people to imagine what it is like to experience the situation he is in and then finishing the piece by suggesting that readers be grateful their private lives aren’t receiving the same scrutiny is sympathetic.
I do however respect your opinion on this and our coverage of the subject. I sense there may still be a gap between our positions but I do appreciate you taking the time to share your views in good faith. We’ll continue to try to give people the best possible information we can from experts and sources you can trust and I hope we can continue to give you content you find interesting and useful.