The Bulletproof Diet

Summary

Maintenance Phase: The Bulletproof Diet – Episode Summary

Host/Authors: Aubrey Gordon & Michael Hobbes
Release Date: March 26, 2025

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Introduction to Bulletproof Coffee

In this episode, Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes delve into the popular health trend known as Bulletproof Coffee, a cornerstone of the Bulletproof Diet developed by Dave Asprey. The hosts aim to dissect the scientific validity behind the claims, explore the origins of the diet, and share their personal experiences with the infamous butter-laden beverage.

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Origins of Bulletproof Coffee

Aubrey Gordon begins by tracing the origins of Bulletproof Coffee to Dave Asprey's trip to Tibet, where Asprey reportedly consumed a traditional drink made of tea and yak butter. Inspired by the invigorating effects, Asprey returned to the U.S. to create a more palatable version using coffee.

• Aubrey Gordon (02:03): "The creator of Bulletproof Coffee is a guy named Dave Asprey. He was hiking in Tibet when he tried a local drink... he felt absolutely incredible after drinking it."

Asprey later transitioned from tea to coffee, finding that butter overwhelmed the tea's flavor but blended seamlessly with coffee, leading to the creation of Bulletproof Coffee as it is known today.

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Health Claims and Critique

The hosts break down the three primary health claims associated with Bulletproof Coffee:

1. Maintains a Fasted State

   • Aubrey Gordon (04:35): "Bulletproof coffee keeps you in a fasted state. That's based on a ketogenic diet framework."

2. Enhances Cognitive Performance

   • Aubrey Gordon (06:49): "Bulletproof claims it leads to enhanced cognitive performance."

3. Low Mold Content in Coffee

   • Aubrey Gordon (12:00): "Most coffee won’t work in making Bulletproof Coffee because it contains mold which outweighs the nutritional benefits."

Gordon and Hobbes critically assess these claims, highlighting the lack of robust scientific evidence. They point out that Asprey's referenced studies often have small sample sizes or are based on animal models, undermining the validity of his assertions.

• Michael Hobbes (08:00): "This is hella janky, but we've also reached sweeping conclusions."

Furthermore, they discuss the exaggerated claims about mold in coffee, emphasizing that modern coffee processing methods effectively eliminate mycotoxins, making Asprey's concerns largely unfounded.

• Aubrey Gordon (11:13): "Coffee growers and roasters take a number of measures to reduce mycotoxins... roasting beans also kills mycotoxins."

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Taste Test Experience

To provide a firsthand account, Michael Hobbes attempts to prepare Bulletproof Coffee following Asprey's recipe: two cups of piping hot brewed coffee, up to two tablespoons of grass-fed butter, and up to two tablespoons of MCT oil.

• Michael Hobbes (16:10): "I'm not tasting the butter at all, actually. It just tastes like a fine cup of coffee."

Both hosts express disappointment, noting that the coffee tasted no different from regular drip coffee despite the hefty amount of butter used.

• Aubrey Gordon (16:25): "Which is kind of amazing. Cause 2 tablespoons of butter is hella."

This shared experience underscores their skepticism about the beverage's touted benefits, as the sensory impact does not align with the significant dietary additions.

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Dave Asprey’s Background and Credibility

A significant portion of the discussion centers on Dave Asprey's credibility. The hosts scrutinize Asprey's background, highlighting his self-proclaimed status as a "biohacker" and his entrepreneurial ventures in the health industry.

• Aubrey Gordon (17:24): "Dave Asprey is a Gen X dude who spent his early career working in IT."

They question Asprey's scientific credentials, pointing out that his claims often lack peer-reviewed support and that he leverages his family's supposed scientific legacy to lend authority.

• Aubrey Gordon (21:02): "But he credentials himself very frequently by talking about how he comes from a family of quote, unquote hard science."

The hosts also mock Asprey's marketing strategies and self-promotion, suggesting that his approach is more about building a brand than advancing legitimate health science.

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Analysis of the Bulletproof Diet Book

Gordon and Hobbes dissect the Bulletproof Diet book, critiquing its complexity and reliance on pseudoscientific principles. They highlight the diet's foundation on keto and intermittent fasting, overlaid with convoluted guidelines that seem designed to create dependency on Asprey's products.

• Aubrey Gordon (34:16): "The functional core of the diet is a mix of keto and intermittent fasting, but it has this overlay of extraordinarily Byzantine guidance."

The hosts emphasize how the diet's intricate rules and classifications (e.g., "kryptonite" foods vs. "bulletproof" foods) serve to confuse followers and increase sales of specialized products.

• Michael Hobbes (37:52): "It's like a spectrum of foods. And then at the bottom it's kryptonites... at the top it's bulletproof foods."

They also criticize the diet's inconsistent nutritional advice and reliance on ancillary products like MCT oil, collagen peptides, and various supplements, arguing that these recommendations lack solid scientific backing.

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Conclusion and Overall Critique

Throughout the episode, Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes maintain a critical stance towards the Bulletproof Diet, emphasizing its lack of scientific rigor and its foundation on marketing rather than evidence-based practices. They argue that the diet exploits psychological needs for control over one’s biology without providing tangible health benefits.

• Aubrey Gordon (52:23): "His approach doesn't immediately present as a grift, in part because of all of that sort of scientific veneer that goes over the top of it, but also because he believes it. I think he's a true believer."

The hosts conclude by encouraging listeners to approach such health fads with skepticism and to rely on established scientific consensus rather than trendy, unverified claims.

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Notable Quotes

• Michael Hobbes (16:10): "I'm not tasting the butter at all, actually. It just tastes like a fine cup of coffee."

• Aubrey Gordon (34:16): "The functional core of the diet is a mix of keto and intermittent fasting, but it has this overlay of extraordinarily Byzantine guidance."

• Aubrey Gordon (52:23): "His approach doesn't immediately present as a grift... but also because he believes it. I think he's a true believer."

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Final Thoughts

Maintenance Phase’s episode on the Bulletproof Diet offers a thorough examination of one of the most talked-about health trends, revealing it to be more hype than substance. Through critical analysis and personal experimentation, Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes provide listeners with valuable insights into the importance of scrutinizing health claims and prioritizing evidence-based practices over marketing-driven fads.

Transcript

[Michael Hobbes]

It's also been clipping a little bit lately because you've.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I feel on my end, I feel.

[Michael Hobbes]

Like you've been doing more bellowing than usual. You're like 6% more bellowy.

[Aubrey Gordon]

That sounds like me.

[Michael Hobbes]

So maybe turn the gain down like 3% or something.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hang on, let me open up the settings.

[Michael Hobbes]

You make things safe. Safe for bellowing.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Bellow safe. That's the Aubrey Gordon promise.

[Michael Hobbes]

Patented Bellow save technology. That's how they sell the microphone for all your left wing podcasting needs. You can shout no as much as you want.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The package is just a line drawing of me giving the A. Okay. And winking like. Wait.

[Michael Hobbes]

So, okay. The reason I. One of the reasons I wanted to jump into this was because I actually have a tagline and it's actually kind of good.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Oh, my God. I can't wait.

[Michael Hobbes]

Michael, you're already bellowing. I am. Welcome to maintenance phase, the podcast that downs your uppers.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Oh.

[Michael Hobbes]

Because that's what we're doing today.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Literally, we kind of are.

[Michael Hobbes]

We're drinking caffeine.

[Aubrey Gordon]

We're canceling coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is also true of us emotionally. People come to us feeling good, and then they listen to our show and they're like, oh, now I'm down. Yeah, I'm also. Aubrey, I'm. So you said we have to record for like four hours for this one. And I'm like, what are we going to talk about for four fucking hours?

[Aubrey Gordon]

There's so much, Michael.

[Michael Hobbes]

I thought this was going to be like 15 minutes long.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I thought this was gonna be like a little light, easy one to be like, we're gonna get more episodes out, it'll be faster.

[Michael Hobbes]

Blah, blah, blah. But then it was us.

[Aubrey Gordon]

But then this is us starring Mandy Moore. And I surprised myself by learning that. Oops. I picked out a 72 ounce steak of a topic. I'm so excited, Michael. Aubrey, what do you know about Bulletproof Coffee? How did it make its way onto your radar? What have you heard? Do you know anybody who drank it or drinks it?

[Michael Hobbes]

This is just coffee with butter in it. No.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yes. Yes.

[Michael Hobbes]

I have not, like, come across this in the wild. I do not, like, read Maxim magazine or, like, wherever the fuck people are getting this stuff.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Maxim magazine? How dare you?

[Michael Hobbes]

What are the metrosexuals reading these days?

[Aubrey Gordon]

So the origin story is pretty straightforward. The creator of Bulletproof Coffee is a guy named Dave Asprey. He was hiking in Tibet when he tried a local drink.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The local drink was tea with yak butter in it. That is a common drink in Tibet. He tried it and he said he felt absolutely incredible after drinking it and came back to the US to test out a version that he could make at home that made him feel the same way.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is like a person on vacation who's like, I feel great when I'm on vacation. And then they want to replicate it when they're home.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah, what if I moved to Jamaica? He says that as he was experimenting at home, he switched from tea to coffee because the flavor of the butter overwhelmed the tea.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The recipe is pretty straightforward. What you're mixing together is two cups of piping hot brewed coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Up to two tablespoons of grass fed butter.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, it has to be grass fed. Sure.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And up to 2 tablespoons of MCT oil.

[Michael Hobbes]

What the fuck is that?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Multi chain triglyceride oil.

[Michael Hobbes]

Dude, do you know what just happened to me?

[Aubrey Gordon]

What?

[Michael Hobbes]

In my life. Because we're doing a taste test later. So I had to go to the store to look for bulletproof liquids. I went to the normal grocery store, and they didn't have anything, so I went to Whole Foods. I had to ask the gentleman working there if they had any bulletproof stuff. I got, like, the coffee grounds. And then he also guided me to, like, the supplements aisle. Oh, shit. I was like, why is he taking me to the supplements aisle? And then he found a bottle of, like, a bottle of liquid brain octane.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Was it brain octane? My God. I don't.

[Michael Hobbes]

It said so many things on the back. It was like, Dr. Bronner. So there's like, all these words coming at me. And I was in a hurry because we were, like, late to record. So I was like, yeah, whatever. Fine, fine, fine. So I get the thing, I go to the checkout, and it's like, bloop, bloop. I start putting them in the bag, and she goes, oh, it's a 75 60. I was like, wait, sorry, I thought you said $75. And then I looked at the little thing, and it was a bottle of MCT oil.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yep.

[Michael Hobbes]

Which was $54.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Jesus God.

[Michael Hobbes]

I mean, it was a relatively large bottle, to be fair. But also I was like, no podcast is worth $54. I'm not.

[Aubrey Gordon]

No, you dropped it. $54.

[Michael Hobbes]

I was like, put this back. There's no fucking way I'm paying $54 for whatever this is. But I think that's because it was like the oil. It wasn't like the coffee butter coffee.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Thing for bulletproof coffee. True believers. You will hear a few key health claims about drinking the butter coffee. One, you will hear that bulletproof coffee, quote, unquote, keeps you in a fasted state while filling you up.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Two, people will say that bulletproof coffee leads to, quote, unquote, enhanced cognitive performance.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Three, you will hear that most coffee won't work in making bulletproof coffee because it contains mold which outweighs the nutritional benefits.

[Michael Hobbes]

I can't. Where are we?

[Aubrey Gordon]

The first claim is that bulletproof coffee keeps you in a fasted state. That's based on a ketogenic diet framework. The idea is that this is a meal replacement.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

We discussed this more in depth in our keto episode, but cardiologists are not fans of this approach.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I will absolutely never forget the doctor who we talked about in the that episode who described the ketogenic diet as the low carb, high coffin diet.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The other thing that this is sort of based on is not specific to bulletproof coffee. It's based on the purported benefits of MCT oil. Multi chain triglyceride oil. So multi chain triglycerides are just straightforwardly fats. They're shorter chains than other fats, which means they're quicker to convert to energy. There's less for your body to break down. So if you're on a keto or keto style diet, the idea is you want to add some MCTs, because that'll be your quickest way to get the kind of energy you would otherwise get from carbohydrates.

[Michael Hobbes]

The thing is, even if the health claims are true, Aubrey, if it's $54, I'm not interested.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Michael, it's not $54 because multi chain triglycerides are naturally found in coconut oil and palm oil. Of course, there has been some research into MCT oil and MCTs, but the benefits in that research are pre modest and the strength of the evidence is just not great. Right.

[Michael Hobbes]

I could just drink coconut milk. I could put that in my coffee. That probably tastes better, honestly, than butter.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Claim number two is that it will enhance your cognitive performance. Dave Asprey says that he ran his own research comparing his bulletproof coffee beans to other coffee beans. So he makes a big show of this. He says that he registered with an IRB and that he worked with a Stanford researcher on his research design. He doesn't say who this person is, what they're credentialed in.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He also doesn't, like, publish the results of the study anywhere. Okay, here is his paragraph describing the Research design.

[Michael Hobbes]

We asked 54 people recruited from the bulletproof executive Facebook page to conduct two batteries of cognitive function tests per day for four weeks while using different combinations of butter and coffee. Lab tested upgraded coffee, black coffee made with beans from a local shop. Lab tested upgraded coffee with butter. Coffee made with beans from a local shop with butter. We did not test MCTS, short chain C8MCTS, or coconut oil because the test was already too long and dropout people not completing the test was a problem. Nonetheless, the results were conclusive. Love that.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And we didn't test half of the recipe. A bunch of people dropped out, but it was conclusive. And we recruited through Facebook, 54 people.

[Michael Hobbes]

Anyway, this is hella janky, but we've also reached sweeping conclusions. Love that. And then he concludes, with or without butter, the coffee from a local coffee shop produced statistically significant lower scores on tests of cognitive function compared to lab tested upgraded coffee beans. Yeah, I mean, this just has, like, no plausible explanation that, like, your coffee beans are so different that it's enhancing cognitive function, but other coffee beans aren't. Like, yeah, I need to see. Give.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I need the tables 100%. I read an interview with a university professor, professor on the bulletproof diet. And her take was essentially something that, like we've said on the show a number of times, which is that nutritional research is extremely difficult to do.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah. Just really hard.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah. To research an individual ingredient or compound in someone's diet, you would have to have people eating identical diets aside from that one ingredient or compound for a sustained period of time. And you would have to know that they're not slipping off of the plan that you have provided for them.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, totally. This is why we try not to, like, make fun of scientists or, like, seem snarky about scientists on this issue just because it's so hard to study.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Michael, let's dig in on that third claim about moldy coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah. What is this? What's going on?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I, like, interviewed coffee roasters.

[Michael Hobbes]

Did you really?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I went on such a fucking journey about this. It is true that coffee can develop mold. The forms of mold that we're talking about here are called mycotoxins 1, which is also what I call you when you're in a bad mood.

[Michael Hobbes]

That's all my. That's all my friends. New Year's resolutions.

[Aubrey Gordon]

My go. Toxins.

[Michael Hobbes]

Cutting mycotoxic out of my life. That's my Irish friends call me when they're mad.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So one of those types of mycotoxins that can grow in coffee is A known carcinogen. That's also true.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

However, in order to consume enough that it would, like, cause health concerns, you have to consume so much coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

You have to. This is our old classic of the dose makes the poison. Right. We are all exposed to low levels of this stuff all the time, and not just through coffee. This particular mycotoxin, which is called Aflatoxin B1, can be found in peanuts, pistachios, dried spices, and corn, among other things. So this is in a lot of things, in extremely low concentrations. Right. Because of that, coffee growers and roasters take a number of measures to reduce mycotoxins. One is that they've developed a process called wet processing. That is the way that most coffee beans are prepared at this point. It involves pulping, fermenting, and drying coffee beans. That's the way coffee is processed now.

[Michael Hobbes]

Wetly, wetly.

[Aubrey Gordon]

After that process, they roast the beans. Because roasting beans also kills mycotoxins. And then after all of that, they discard any crops with unsafe levels as set by the fda.

[Michael Hobbes]

So they're marketing something that is like a legal requirement, like, we pay our taxes.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah. And to be fair, their argument is we have even fewer than other brands. Right. To none at all. Like, that's sort of what they're saying. But here's the thing that broke my brain, Mike. Even if they didn't do any of those things, mycotoxins make coffee taste bad, so they can't sell it.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, okay, so there's already, like a built in incentive.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yes, yes. So, like, mycotoxins change the taste of coffee. They make it taste extremely bitter.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So it also just, like, wouldn't be in their best interest to try and sell shit that people would then drink and be like, this is gross.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Dave Asprey says that they don't actually screen well enough for mold and that actually bulletproof is the only one doing sort of some form of proprietary mold screening. But he doesn't really go into, like, what are they doing?

[Michael Hobbes]

Right. So he's not technically lying, or potentially he's not technically lying, but he's giving you the impression of something that isn't true.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So, Michael, are you ready to taste test some goddamn bulletproof coffee?

[Michael Hobbes]

Let's do it. I have not eaten breakfast yet today, so this is gonna be me in a fasting state.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Oh, you're gonna do it correctly.

[Michael Hobbes]

Listeners can weigh in on whether I seem smarter afterwards, give me more feedback on my personality.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I really like that you and I both Got the high achiever from Bulletproof, which is enhanced coffee with added B vitamins, lion's mane and coffee berry. Sure. I am gonna send you the little recipe.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And what you're supposed to do is blend it to emulsify it, which I cannot do. You cannot do. I can do.

[Michael Hobbes]

So two cups of coffee up to two tablespoons. I mean, I don't have grass fed butter, but I feel like normal ass butter.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Can I read to you the description from the Brain Octane that you didn't buy?

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, yeah, yeah. Do it.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Crave less, do more.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Brain octane C8 MCT oil is no ordinary MCT oil.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Sourced purely from coconuts, like coconut oil ordinary. It contains the most ketogenic MCT oil. Pure C8 caprylic acid. An easy to absorb high quality smart fat.

[Michael Hobbes]

Sure.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So that's me. I'm a high quality smart fat that rapidly converts into brain powering fat burning ketone energy. Brain octane C8 MCT oil helps control cravings, jump starts your metabolism, and improves cognitive performance to keep you sharp.

[Michael Hobbes]

It would be so funny if they said it's fortified with muscle. Mycotoxins. This special thing that actually makes you smarter. It's like any of these. Mold is good for you. Mold is bad for you. It's all just people saying stuff.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So, Mike, I'm curious about what your coffee looks like. Mine has been through a blender. Yours has.

[Michael Hobbes]

Not mine. Okay, there's. When I was living in Berlin, there's like a restaurant in East Berlin that's, like, famous for, like. It's like the garlic restaurant. That's like the theme. Every single thing on the menu has garlic in it, including the desserts. So they have famously garlic ice cream. And I was like, okay, whatever. I'll go there. I had, like, a normal spaghetti dinner. And then I had. I was like, all right, fine, I'll try the garlic ice cream. And then you taste it, and it literally just tastes like someone took Breyer's ice cream and, like, crushed a bunch of garlic in it. You're like, yep, that's garlic in some fucking vanilla ice cream. It was, like, not more than the sum of its parts. I feel like this is the same thing where, like, it looks like just coffee with, like, a centimeter of butter floating on top of it. And then when you smell it. But it, like, it smells like coffee and butter. There's not. I mean, I don't know what I expected.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah. I was gonna say mine smells exactly like coffee and exactly like butter. It smells kind of like a diner.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm also glad you didn't get the oil, because he does warn you about putting too much MCT oil in your coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, surely it's gonna separate.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah, that's not what he's concerned with. He's concerned with a side effect that he refers to consistently throughout the book as disaster pants.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, God.

[Aubrey Gordon]

What?

[Michael Hobbes]

Why do all these things involve pooping? Just give me a normal diet that doesn't change my poop. There's a new euphemism for shitting myself in my brain.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Brought to you from the era of amazeballs and awesome songs.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Please enjoy disaster pants.

[Michael Hobbes]

All right, we have to do this very quickly. The second I stop stirring it, just like, all the butter flows back to the top.

[Aubrey Gordon]

You ready?

[Michael Hobbes]

Are we doing three, two, one?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Sure. You count us down.

[Michael Hobbes]

Wait, you do the countdowns.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Three, two, one, go.

[Michael Hobbes]

I'm not tasting the butter at all, actually. It just tastes like a fine cup of coffee.

[Aubrey Gordon]

It's fascinating to me because, like, all of the celebrity coverage was like, it's the creamiest latte you've ever had. It's the best. Blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, no, it tastes like drip coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

Which is kind of amazing. Cause 2 tablespoons of butter is hella. I was noticing when I was putting it in, I was like, damn, a lot of butter.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So much.

[Michael Hobbes]

Do you feel smarter, Aubrey? Do you? Do you? Are we sharper?

[Aubrey Gordon]

The appeal eludes me. I really thought I was gonna be like, hey, man, I gotta hand it to him. This tastes really good, man. But it tastes just sort of like coffee. Like a cup of drip coffee.

[Michael Hobbes]

So we endorse. We wholeheartedly endorse bulletproof coffee. The rest of this episode will be a series of affiliate codes where we tell you, Michael, if it tastes fine, all of the health claims are true.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So Bulletproof Coffee comes to us from a real character named Dave Asprey. He is a self describ biohacker, and the headlines about him often include that he has spent over a million dollars on his own biohacking. He is also out here pretty constantly talking about how he intends to live to 180.

[Michael Hobbes]

Women do not talk about how much money they've spent on diets in the same way.

[Aubrey Gordon]

No. And if you did, it would be with, like, such weird shame.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

It would be a bummer. You wouldn't be like, check me out.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Dave Asprey is a Gen X dude who spent his early career Working in it. Okay. On his website, it says, quote, as a true pioneer, Dave was the first person to ever sell a product online.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, well, I mean, maybe totally.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Mike. How would you even determine that? Mike, Mike. The journey that I went on, trying to disconfirm this. Michael, Michael, Michael. Michael. It's clear. So he did sell products online in 1994. That is the first year. Like, when you look at retrospectives on the beginnings of E commerce, they talk about 1994 being the first year that people are figuring out how to sell things on the Internet. But when people tell that story, they tell a story of a totally different dude. And then also a story of Pizza Hut.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, what?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Figuring out some online ordering through pizza hut in 1994.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oof. You were not getting that pizza. That pizza's coming on Wednesday.

[Aubrey Gordon]

You had to wait an hour for the image of the website to download. So when the story gets told of the beginnings of E commerce, no one is mentioning Dave Asprey. Dave Asprey is the one mentioning Dave Asprey.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Can I tell you what the product he was selling was?

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah. What is it?

[Aubrey Gordon]

It was T shirts with an illustration of the caffeine molecule.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And the phrase caffeine is my drug of choice.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, my God. It was, like, bad. Like, Boomer memes on a T shirt.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I cook with wine. Sometimes I even put it in the food. Right? Like, that's the, like, level that we're at here.

[Michael Hobbes]

I was selling cringe T shirts on the Internet when cringe T shirts would put a glimmer in your eye.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Wow, dude.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yes. You're, like, so cool, Dave.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Like most biohackers, he has an origin story that is sort of gussied up, but is ultimately an absolutely bog standard dieting origin story. Essentially, he was fatter than he wanted to be, and his mind wasn't as sharp as he wanted it to be. Okay, I'm gonna send you a quote. This is from a New York Times profile of Dave Asprey from 2015. And it really sort of encapsulates that little origin story.

[Michael Hobbes]

It's a says after his failed low calorie diet, he tried the zone Atkins, raw veganism, high protein, and intermittent fasting. At the same time, he went to extreme lengths to collect additional data on his body's performance. He had adrenal testing done to better understand how his hormones worked. Extensive blood work let him monitor his glucose and albumin levels. He got DNA tests to look for genes that might cause immunodeficiency and sent out samples of his feces to learn about the microbes in his digestive tract. He bought an electroencephalogram or EEG machine to monitor his brain waves. Once, in 2006, hoping to treat gut problems, he placed an order online for a shipment of parasites called porcine whipworm. The eggs arrived from Thailand a few days later in a saline solution. He drank the whole thing, hoping they would trigger an anti inflammatory reaction in his gut. They didn't. That's what the early Internet was. Is Griffin. That's the only thing you could get on the early Internet was cute t shirts and worms.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Dave Asprey is not himself a scientist.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

But he credentials himself very frequently by talking about how he comes from a family of quote, unquote hard science.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, what, what does that mean?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm not a doctor, but my wife is an M.D.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Who not for nothing in press very frequently. They like make little notes that are. His wife disagrees.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, so he's using her as a credential. But also, she says he's full of shit.

[Aubrey Gordon]

She's like, that's not right. Yeah.

[Michael Hobbes]

Also, my dad is a dentist. And I am not qualified to give you advice about your dad 100%.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Like, my dad is a pilot, but I can't fly a plane.

[Michael Hobbes]

Exactly.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Part of the stolen valor is my wife is an md and part of the stolen valor is my grandparents were scientists.

[Michael Hobbes]

Grandparents.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And when you go, oh, what kind of science were your grandparents parents practicing? He says, my grandparents worked on the Manhattan Project.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh.

[Aubrey Gordon]

To which I say, that's not the flex you think it is.

[Michael Hobbes]

That's also so fucking weird because it's not anything to do with nutrition. And also, it's your grandparents, not even your parents.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Right. They didn't pass that knowledge down to you genetically.

[Michael Hobbes]

My credentials are impeccable. My wife disagrees with me and she kidded her. And my grandparents did one of the most infamously bad things with a lot last hundred years.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So he defines biohacking for himself as, quote, the art and science of changing the environment around you or inside you so that you have full control of your own biology. Now, clue number one, that he is maybe not a scientist himself is the phrase so that you have full control of your own biology.

[Michael Hobbes]

I kind of appreciate the fact that it's so just like openly fulfilling a psychological need 100%. He's like, this is the way that you can take back control of your body, which you lost control of. It's like, yeah, we're all getting older, man.

[Aubrey Gordon]

But also it Feels like this weird combo of men having nowhere to put any feelings that are not like rage or victory. Right. And men not being able to take a single fucking l, even one as standard as just like, oh, you have a human body that's aging.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right. But have you considered that I don't want to die?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Totally. And there's like this class overlay, right, where like Dave Asprey is talking about spending a million dollars, Brian Johnson is talking about spending multiple millions of dollars. And there is like this class layer that is like, I'm gonna buy the thing that other people. The one thing that other people can, which is a version of immortality.

[Michael Hobbes]

Their only solution to problems is throwing money at them.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So you would think this would be a guy with a lot of systemic critiques of like environmental safety, of regulation, of a bunch of stuff. And I will say it does not tilt in the direction of good health care for all, right?

[Michael Hobbes]

Of course not. It never does. Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm sending you a quote from a Forbes profile of Asprey.

[Michael Hobbes]

Asprey dreams of a world where instead of deferring to medical experts and profit seeking drug companies, we become experts in our own systems and experiment on them at will. Unsurprisingly, this has made Asprey suspicious of regulation. Regulation got us the food pyramid that causes heart disease, cancer and diabetes in unprecedented numbers of people. He told me it got us an incredibly slow to innovate medical system that's now being disrupted. It is anti human to tell someone that they do not have the choice to put whatever they want into their bodies. It's basic human freedom. I think it's unethical that I need to spend $150 in an hour, my life, life to get a permission slip to take a substance. There is no, no reason for that. Parentheses. Asprey's wife disagrees. Dude. So he's just like kind of an asshole with these kind of like quasi, not quite right wing beliefs, but like on ramp to right wing beliefs. Yeah. Or at least like the kind of just like brain dead anti system stuff that we saw in the Blue Zones documentary where he's like, you're not going to find the truth in some petri dish.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Except Asprey is like lovingly gazing into the reflecting pool of a thousand petri dishes. He's so happy. Like, oh, Narcissus in the petri dish. Yeah, I mean, I think like he does have systemic critiques. Right. But the systemic critiques are like too much red tape. Get out of here.

[Michael Hobbes]

They're dumb.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Who Needs a doctor. Right? They're bad. They're bad. Systemic critiques.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

As bulletproof coffee sort of broke through, Bulletproof coffee is getting more and more popular. And while that's happening, Dave Asprey is busy building a business. Right. He's selling bulletproof's own coffee, which he calls, quote unquote, upgraded coffee, which they say is low mold, and some of which has additives like adaptogens and that sort of thing. Right. B vitamins, that kind of thing. They also sell a bulletproof powdered creamer for your bulletproof coffee. So he's gone straight from, like, make coffee with these ingredients. You can get anywhere. To make coffee with these ingredients you can only be 100% sure of if you buy them from me also.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah. Wait a. This just occurred to me because I don't put milk in my coffee. But, like, what's between putting butter in your coffee and putting cream in your coffee?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Not much.

[Michael Hobbes]

Isn't that something thousands, like, millions of people do all the time? How did this just occur to me now?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I think as far as his thinking appears to go on that front is, well, I used to drink coffee with cream in it, and that didn't make me feel amazing. And biohacked, this did. Right. He also starts selling protein bars with collagen. He starts selling supplements like melatonin gummies and apple cider vinegar gummies and like a greens powder.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, God.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He has a vision supplement called Eye Armor.

[Michael Hobbes]

Just say, this is for your dick. Just, it's all dick juice.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Your dick.

[Michael Hobbes]

Your dick will get bigger if you drink this shit.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Please don't say dick juice. I beg to differ. Don't call it dick juice.

[Michael Hobbes]

Men just, like, need to be told that everything is like, you're. You're a gladiator. You're not taking a supplement from there.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He starts working on a diet book, the Bulletproof Diet, which is published in 2014. As part of the book rollout, Dave Asprey got a really significant amount of mainstream coverage. He gets this profile in Forbes. He gets a profile in Men's Health. He gets covered in the New York Times in a stellar profile from Jay Wortham. And I think the thing that is really notable to me here is that the coverage of Dave Asprey is like a resounding no.

[Michael Hobbes]

We love that. Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

It's a rare moment where we get to go, hey, good job, media. This is like, actually the level of skepticism that you should be bringing to any number of miracle health claims.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The other dust up that he has is as it turns out, with the ftc, of course. Of course.

[Michael Hobbes]

I was waiting for this chapter.

[Aubrey Gordon]

What do you think can tell me what you. What's your guess of what the FTC is citing him on?

[Michael Hobbes]

It's gotta be false claims, right? It's gotta be selling products with like, this boosts your immunity or something like, that's what they got lucky charms for that letter.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Here's my other clue to you. That letter was sent in June 2020.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, I was just gonna say, what kind of COVID grifting was he doing? Is he a certified importer of Pete Evans's like Red Light that cures Covid?

[Aubrey Gordon]

The letter that they sent him is about a specific blog post on his website. The title of that blog post is what I do to protect myself from Coronavirus and How I plan to Kick it if I get it. In this post, he describes Covid as being primarily about inflammation.

[Michael Hobbes]

Sure.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And then lists a bunch of things he does and consumes to reduce inflammation. What he's referring to is sage, oregano, bay leaf, olive oil, vitamin D, zinc, magnesium, CoQ10L, glutamine, bulletproofs, unfair advantage supplement, omega 3 fatty acids. And all of those, my good man, are Amazon affiliate links.

[Michael Hobbes]

We didn't even know anything about the virus. Like actual scientists did not know terribly much about the virus in June of 2020.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Right. People are wiping down Doritos bags.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yes, I know.

[Aubrey Gordon]

With Clorox wipes. Yeah.

[Michael Hobbes]

These guys are already promising they know the secret.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Dave Asprey has also been back in the news again in the last few months. The Washington Post quoted him in a piece just a couple months ago in January, and I am sending you that quote.

[Michael Hobbes]

It says, Dave Asprey, an author, podcaster and self professed founder of the biohacking movement, says he believes Kennedy's influence would even the playing field with big pharmaceutical corporations and allow companies such as his to make broader claims about health benefits. The FDA requires positive results in rigorous clinical trials before drugs and products can be declared cures or designated to treat certain conditions. This is the dawning of a new age of biohacking because Bobby Kennedy. Kennedy is going to remove the use of regulations that prevent competition, said Asprey.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So he's like, hooray, we're not going to have to warn people anymore about the side of like, it's so nuts to say that shit out loud to a reporter from the Washington Post.

[Michael Hobbes]

These guys are basically like, they're openly saying, the FDA won't let us lie to you.

[Aubrey Gordon]

There are so Many layers to what is going on. And every product that he sells have, like, five or six factual claims in the marketing materials. And, like, so it's just like an app, Just a thicket of fact checking.

[Michael Hobbes]

And also it feels almost perfunctory because it's like every single thing that comes out of his mouth is, like, bullshit. Very.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Shit. But it's cool. My wife is a doctor, and my grandparents had something to do with the atomic.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Okay, so, Mike, from here, we are going to go ahead and dive into the actual text of the actual Bulletproof Diet. Fuck yes. That's where we're going next is the.

[Michael Hobbes]

Name of the book. This time, baby. All be Bulletproof.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Good job. Good job.

[Michael Hobbes]

I'm actually very curious about this because what else is there? It's butter and coffee. It's like one item, and then you have to build, like, a whole lifestyle around it somehow.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm actually gonna send you a quote from the introduction to the Bulletproof Diet that is a really tight little encapsulation of sort of like, all of the promises that it is making.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, I want to mispronounce this word so bad to troll people. But I'm gonna. I'm gonna. I'm gonna do it correctly. We already had too many fucking emails. Okay, I'm gonna say it right. I'm gonna say it right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm gonna do the Peter thing and start complaining about people complaining to me.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yes. Okay, this may seem like hyperbole, but your diet is the foundation behind not only your weight, but also your iq, stress level levels, risk of disease, physical performance, aging, and even willpower. You are what you eat. What would it feel like to improve in all of these areas simply by making better choices about what you put on your plate? When you begin following the Bulletproof Diet, you'll know the answer within only two weeks while losing up to a pound a day and never feeling deprived or hungry. Oh, sweetie. This is the bullshit they've been selling women for, like, decades. Totally. Just starve yourself, lose a ton of weight, but, like, you won't feel hungry. Bestie.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Totally. But it's from a dude and a CEO and a pioneer of online commerce.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah. And it's. And he's doing this whole, like, reducing your stress levels and, like, high performance. Like, it's male coded.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah.

[Michael Hobbes]

But it's basically somehow, like, to lose a pound a day. We're talking about essentially not eating or barely eating. So the idea that you can not eat and also perform well and not feel hungry. Like, I'm sorry. That this just is not going to happen.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He claims that he personally increased his IQ through following.

[Michael Hobbes]

How did I not even mention that? I was like, we don't have time to get into the IQ stuff.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The bulletproof diet includes either nods to or prescriptions to the keto diet, intermittent fasting, sleep hygiene, grounding mats, collagen peptides, raw milk, animal fats, high intensity interval training, anti inflammatory diet diets, and lots of references to your quote unquote lizard brain.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, good stuff.

[Aubrey Gordon]

God, it is just a sludge of 2010s wellness trends.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is one of those. Oftentimes people will ask us, like, hey, is there an episode that I can, like, send my mom because she's, like, getting really into intermittent fasting or something with this? It's like, I'm sorry, you just have to listen to the entire corpus of the show a little bit. Listen to 130 episodes. Because all of this stuff is that we've, like, addressed in various places, but it's. It's sort of all the same brand of, like, grift.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The functional core of the diet is a mix of keto and intermittent fasting, but it has this overlay of extraordinarily byzantine guidance.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

According to the bulletproof diet, quote unquote, healthy fats should make up 50 to 70% of your calories for the day. The guidance around protein is a little bit squishier. He says that you should aim for, quote, between 0.325 and 0.75 grams of protein a day per pound of body weight. Okay, Michael, it's time for my favorite game.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, I was about to. I didn't want to be the one to ask, like, what does this mean for you, Aubrey?

[Aubrey Gordon]

All right, Michael, we're doing it. 3, 325 to 0.75 grams of protein a day per pound of body weight. I am currently in the neighborhood of 330 pounds. According to this, I need to eat between 107 and 248 grams of protein per day.

[Michael Hobbes]

How much dried cod is that? You're on, like, the rock diet.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Another way of looking at it is in eggs. 17 to 41 eggs per day.

[Michael Hobbes]

That's not even a diet issue. I'm worried about your fiber finances.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So that's your protein guidance. And that's only supposed to make up 20% of the calories that you eat for the day. Okay, so I should be eating 41 eggs and then five times that many calories of something else, and then like.

[Michael Hobbes]

A side of carb Free hash Browns, but like 41 of them.

[Aubrey Gordon]

All of that happens within a six hour, quote, unquote feeding window.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is the intermittent fast, intermittent fasting thing.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Okay. On top of all of that, there are specific schedules for protein fasting and carb refeeding.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay. It always has to be so weirdly specific.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'm sending you a little quote once.

[Michael Hobbes]

A week on days six and 13, you'll get to try out bulletproof protein fasting to get a thorough scrub down of your cells that will make you feel, look and think like a much younger person. Person. It's important to stick to the program on these days and limit your protein intake by eating the recommended meals. Oh, so you're overeating protein on some days and under eating protein on other days?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yes, totally.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is also your opportunity to refeed on carbohydrates. And I focused the meal plan for those days to include the most beneficial bulletproof, high carb, low protein meals. Why? Oh, he's just like making things harder.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Than they have to be 100%.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is also something we've talked about. The pattern is you make the diet as arcane and complicated as possible. So that, that way when people fail, you can always say, oh, it's your fault for not following this, like, deranged set of rules.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Well, and I think in this case. Right. He's selling this as sort of a cutting edge, scientific kind of approach. And I think there's something about having a lot of really complicated, intricate steps to follow.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

That gives the impression that it's been really rigorously tested. So you have to do it this way. And not that the rigorous testing was like Facebook recruitment.

[Michael Hobbes]

This honestly sounds like he's like my wario. Like he's on Google Scholar reading the abstract and then like concluding a bunch of things.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So he creates categories to describe what I would call like red light, yellow light, and green light foods. Okay, here, so describe to me, Michael, what you're seeing here.

[Michael Hobbes]

It's like a spectrum of foods. And then at the bottom it's kryptonites. Those are the worst foods. And then at the top it's bulletproof foods. And so at the top, the most bulletproof starches are pumpkin, butternut squash, sweet potato, the Mike lifestyle, yams and carrots. And then at the bottom, the worst starches are wheat, corn, millet, other grains, potato starch, corn starch, gluten free powder. And then in between, he's got various other. Yeah, like black rice, wild rice, potatoes. They're all at kind of like, different levels of the spectrum. This seems fine to me. Aubrey. I think foods. I think foods are inherently good or bad. Yeah, we can place them all on a spectrum.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Absolutely. And quinoa is one of the worst.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, quinoa is the second worst. Buckwheat oats. Quinoa coming for oats.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Also, interestingly, white rice is the second to the best tier, Right? Second closest to bulletproof. But black rice, wild rice, and brown rice are like, dead center.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, that's weird because usually people are like, brown rice is way better than white rice because of the extra fiber.

[Aubrey Gordon]

That's the level of, like, granularity we're talking about here. He has another one of fruits, and he's like, the best fruits you can have are blackberries and raspberries and coconut. But blueberries are not very good. What? And cantaloupe is the worst for you.

[Michael Hobbes]

Wait, what is he basing this on?

[Aubrey Gordon]

He's basing this on. On like a bizarre little pastiche that he has developed in his brain of weird little straggly bits of research from different places. Some of this is ranked based on mold. Some of it is ranked based on anti nutrients. Some of it is ranked based on how it personally makes Dave Asprey feel.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And he's not really telling you where the sources of each of those rankings are coming from. There are studies in this book that have an N of 2.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, really nice.

[Aubrey Gordon]

One of the studies that I looked at had an N of 2.

[Michael Hobbes]

It would be very funny to, like, as a flex, be like, oh, you're basing your health advice on an anecdote? Mine's twice as good as that. Mine's based on two anecdotes.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Actually, the guidance beyond specific foods is very, very strange. He has specific guidance on cooking meat. He's like, the most bulletproof way to cook meat is. Is to cook it as little as possible.

[Michael Hobbes]

Why are these guys like this quote.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Grass fed animal products are much less likely to contain parasites, pathogens and toxins.

[Michael Hobbes]

What's that?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Than those from grain fed animals. So I think it's safe to eat them on the rare side. He says this a number of times.

[Michael Hobbes]

Because food safety comes from the handling of it after it's been killed. It's not the diet of the animal.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Right. When he talks about grass fed meat, he talks about it in opposition, not reliably to grain fed meat, but to factory farming.

[Michael Hobbes]

But also, grass fed meat is also made at like, a large scale by large corporations.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Totally.

[Michael Hobbes]

It's not as if like Jeff the farmer down the street is producing all of like the grass fed stuff. This is, I think so much of this stuff does fulfill a kind of psychological need because it feels like he's telling himself, if I eat the right foods, I won't get food poisoning.

[Aubrey Gordon]

It is self talk made real.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He says that if you do have to cook meat, you should boil it.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, what?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Quote, Boiling water prevents oxidation of fats and proteins because it displaces most of the oxygen. Boiled meat often isn't particularly flavorful, but it's fine for soups and shredded meat dishes. Boiled vegetables are healthy and the extra water you drain away may remove unwanted anti nutrients.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh my God. May.

[Aubrey Gordon]

May is doing some heavy lifting in that one.

[Michael Hobbes]

That's why International Workers Day is in May because it does so much work. This is somehow more offensive to me than like the misinformation because I'm like, this is going to taste like shit. Dave, boiled meat sucks.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He also has guidance on what to do when you're going out to eat at a restaurant. Dave Asprey writes that when he goes out to eat, he brings some things with him. He brings a stick of grass fed butter, he brings a container of brain octane. Dude, MCT oil, and he brings some sea salt.

[Michael Hobbes]

Dude, that's so passive aggressive to go to a fucking restaurant with your own food.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Sometimes. He says he also brings an avocado. That way he says he can order something basic and quote, pump it up to meet your new standards.

[Michael Hobbes]

I guarantee there's an entire discord server of waitresses who've had to serve him at a restaurant. Like, did you get the weird butter stick?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Just this guy came, came in with wraparound blue blocker sunglasses and his own MCT oil.

[Michael Hobbes]

He's like, ooh, just a water please.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Do you wanna know what his breakfast order is when he goes out to eat?

[Michael Hobbes]

Just the waitress's phone number.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He says that he orders poached eggs and then melts his grass fed butter on top and pours MCT oil over.

[Michael Hobbes]

It at a restaurant.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Dave, are you going into a restaurant with a stick of room temp butter in your pocket?

[Michael Hobbes]

This is, it's like, it's like having like a toddler where you have to explain like, no, no, no, this is where we go and other people make food. We don't bring our own food to the restaurant. It's like so weird.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He says, quote, I've even done this in four star hotel restaurants. If the chef notices we Always have an interesting conversation.

[Michael Hobbes]

Again, a load bearing word in that sentence. Interesting conversation. What the fuck is wrong with you, bro?

[Aubrey Gordon]

And listen, there are people who have dietary restrictions who have severe food allergies, and then you got these guys with their optional ass like, I gotta live to 180. Shit.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Like, I just read this whole section about going out to eat and I was like, you are the reason for the no substitutions signs.

[Michael Hobbes]

Instead of having fries on the side, mind if I just have this overripe avocado that I brought from my home?

[Aubrey Gordon]

Now I have a quote for you that's just funny. I just read it and it was extremely funny. So I'm sending to you because it's funny.

[Michael Hobbes]

You may not know it, but you've always been on the bulletproof diet. You may have just made poorer choices in the past and eaten more kryptonite than you have been for the past two weeks, but that's because you didn't have a roadmap or a tool to help you navigate it.

[Aubrey Gordon]

You were always on this diet. You've just been fucking it up.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, you've just been terrible. Haven't you always been drinking butter in your coffee? You just haven't been putting butter in your coffee.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I did not mention to you that Dave Asprey has a very specific look to him.

[Michael Hobbes]

Let's make fun of his looks. Please, Aubrey, just once on this show. You know what? We deserve a treat. Let's do it head to toe. Let's start with the ears.

[Aubrey Gordon]

No, no, no.

[Michael Hobbes]

Dammit.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He is in a constant state of wearing these very funny looking to me, wrap around glasses with like orange, yellow tinted le.

[Michael Hobbes]

Does he drive a cyber truck?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I mean, I wouldn't be surprised.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay. He has cybertruck energy.

[Aubrey Gordon]

No. You know what he has? It's not cybertruck, it's Segway.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, they're gonna take over. We're all gonna be on these things in another couple months. Yes. That is the meanest thing you've ever said about anyone on this show. That is. That is the deepest dig on anyone. That's worse than making fun of his looks. Be like this motherfucking. Or would have been into Segways. Oh, no. I've never seen you like this, Aubrey.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Wow. She's a monster.

[Michael Hobbes]

Let's just sit in silence and think about what we've done. Some cold shit.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So I wanted to close this out by talking about some of the core tactics that he is using here because I think it's a really interesting window into the kinds of tactics that get deployed in diets that are predominantly marketed toward men. A big part of this book is that he has tons and tons and tons of footnotes. Dave Asprey is citing his studies. He's doing it. What he's not doing is telling you how hard he is Cherry picking.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is a thing that people often say. They're like, the left is criticizing my book for being unravel, rigorous, But I have 74 pages of footnotes. It obviously is the quality of the footnotes and whether you're, like, accurately describing what's in the footnotes.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Absolutely. And the majority of his citations that I, like, checked into are for rat studies.

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, really?

[Aubrey Gordon]

One of the studies was about rats with kidney disease. And he's like, that's why humans need to eat this way for the rest of your life. Right, right. The human studies that he cites often have vanishingly small sample sizes. He cites a number of studies that sound like rock solid. And he presents them with a great deal of confidence. And only through some pretty extensive, like, googling around about the researchers and the topic and who are the voices in the field. Do you realize that he's citing a study that has been pretty widely discredited?

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He also draws on studies about people with specific health conditions, but doesn't disclose that in the narrative. Narrative. So, for example, he'll tell you about findings about, like, blood sugar and mortality, but he doesn't tell you that that study was looking at people with diabetes, Right?

[Michael Hobbes]

Oh, right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He does this with, like, kidney stuff. He does it with a number of health conditions where he acts as if the findings are general.

[Michael Hobbes]

I did not read the text of this book, obviously, but I do think it'd be very funny if he's like, you should drink MCT oil. Oil. And then there's an asterisk, and you follow the asterisk and it says, if you are a rat with diabetes, I.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Would love it if the asterisk just said, no, you shouldn't.

[Michael Hobbes]

This is fake, but I'm saying it anyway.

[Aubrey Gordon]

The last thing I will say in this sort of category is that he really does straightforwardly ignore counter evidence. He never really acknowledges the weaknesses in his own interpretation. He never really says, hey, if you want to do this with me, come on down. But definitely, like, proceed at your own risk.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So it sounds like what he's describing is scientific consensus.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

But that's just because he's not really bothered with having a broader, more contextualized, more grounded and accurate conversation.

[Michael Hobbes]

I want to say it's weird to me, but it's not that weird. But it's frustrating that over and over again people refuse to spread the actual scientific consensus, which is that like, we just don't know that there's a specific lifestyle that is going to produce health for every single person. And I don't find this all that difficult to like, acknowledge and that I can like. I love riding my bike. I don't think everybody should ride their bike. Some people don't like biking. It's fine.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I mean, I think in some ways that kind of evangelism comes from like a really human place of like, oh, totally. Yeah. I discovered a thing. I really like it and I used to feel bad, but now I feel better.

[Michael Hobbes]

Totally, totally.

[Aubrey Gordon]

I want for other people to also feel better.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

And my assumption is if it worked for me, then it works for everyone. This is where we all reveal ourselves to be like a little more self centered, centered than we think of ourselves as being. Right?

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, totally.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He also, throughout the book, plays both sides of the same argument. I think this is sort of a human fallibility thing that sometimes we'll say that something like it's a benefit that something is really inexpensive and other times something being really inexpensive makes it suspect. Right?

[Michael Hobbes]

I would never suspect anything for being inexpensive. But yes.

[Aubrey Gordon]

He frequently talks about things that he positions as being on the cutting edge because there are only animal studies about it or because it's under researched in some other way. He finds ways to make a lack of research evidence something that is like, good.

[Michael Hobbes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Aubrey Gordon]

But also when he's talking about things he does not like, he's like, it's really scary how little data there is here.

[Michael Hobbes]

Okay.

[Aubrey Gordon]

In his section about artificial sweeteners, he writes, quote, there have been very few studies on the safety of the artificial sweetener Ace Cat in humans and researchers are concerned about it. This is scary. And my personal experiences with Ace K are even scarier. I developed benign nodules on my thyroid from consuming high amounts of Ace K in the late 90s. Went on an Atkins style diet. Okay, so you're like, well, you had a bad experience and you don't trust this thing. Ergo, you're like, the lack of research is really concerned, but you tried another thing and it made you personally feel better. So you're like, the lack of research just means they don't want you to know. Lack of research just means it's like too new and cutting edge.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Again, it's a tough one because it is like a Human thing. You and I have talked about this offline. I think it's part of the reason that I find arguments about people being hypocrites, like, not very effective or moving because we're kind of all doing that all the time.

[Michael Hobbes]

Completely. Yes. I'm not going to pretend I have these, like, content neutral standards for doing science either. Like, I'm a biased human being just like everybody else. Completely.

[Aubrey Gordon]

So it's a tough one to be like, look out for this thing that humans sort of just do, but, like, do look out for this thing that humans just sort of do. Right.

[Michael Hobbes]

Because, like, there are hazards in the world that have not been studied adequately and like, maybe it will turn out that there are food additives or something that are causing real harm. But also, you can't just say this is harmful because there's no reason. Research. And this other thing, this is good because there's no research.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Yeah, absolutely. And also, again, you have to be willing to trust that Dave Asprey is giving you the correct citations here and the right numbers and that he's citing them correctly and that they're like, you know, from like the NIH and not from like Moviefone or whatever. You know what I mean? Like, you have to be willing to trust him. But when it's presented in this package of a book that is, is, you know, several hundred pages long and has a ton of footnotes and is flooding you with information that sounds really technical and is being presented by someone who has an immense amount of confidence in his own analysis, it's really easy for this kind of stuff to slip under the radar just because you're getting overwhelmed with so much of what looks like information.

[Michael Hobbes]

Right.

[Aubrey Gordon]

His approach doesn't immediately present as a grift, in part because of all of that sort of like scientific veneer that goes over the top of it, but also because he believes it. Like, I think he's a true believer. Right. So it doesn't strike you as inauthentic, which means it often will strike people as being true. Right.

[Michael Hobbes]

I really want one of his citations to be to like, snap a lid. 1997.

[Aubrey Gordon]

That's it for the show. Notes, my guy. Hey, we did it. How you feeling?

[Michael Hobbes]

Good. What do we want to conclude?

[Aubrey Gordon]

I'd just like to remind all of our listeners that you've always been on the bulletproof diet. You've just been fucking it up.

[Michael Hobbes]

You've. You've already been there, done that, messed around.

[Aubrey Gordon]

Sa.