Hater Season: Victoria Song & Alex Cranz

8:58Victoria Song:Do you know what a supplement is? Not regulated by the FD fucking A. It's not regulated.

9:04Alex Cranz:well first of all would Hugh Jackman lie to me because

9:08Victoria Song:yes Hugh Jackman fucking lied to you because he's tap dancing on the AG1 fucking things he's saying superfood do you know what superfood is it's a marketing label it's not a scientific term it's a marketing label all it means is a nutrient it's a nutrient dense food that's all that that means it's a marketing label this is why I hate wellness

9:31Alex Cranz:no but this is the thing it's like So number one doctor recommended brand means nothing, I'm guessing.

9:38Victoria Song:Which doctors?

9:40Alex Cranz:Real doctors? Victoria, so - Dr.

9:42Victoria Song:Huberman?

9:43Alex Cranz:Dr. Huberman's not -

9:44Victoria Song:Don't trust Dr. Huberman. You know, I had a - That is actually the guy on there. No, I had a doctor who said, hey, have you listened to the Huberman podcast? And guess what I did? I fired them. As in, I found a new doctor. I didn't say you're fired. But I was like, I can't trust you if you believe that man who just basically also partners with AG1 to make AGZ, which is like a sleep thing. And it's just, okay, look, okay. So I went through their clinical studies, their quote unquote clinical studies. What did you say? Was it good? Here's the thing. When you have a drug or a medical treatment, it goes through clinical trials to make sure it's efficacious and safe and to find out what the efficacious dose is.

10:27Victoria Song:This is a supplement. it is not regulated this is not required so they're just doing voluntary clinic clinical studies to show marketing because it's like hey guess what we saw an improvement in the gut microbiome and all this other shit which is like again your your gut is your second brain your gut and your brain talk to each other it can affect your condition and your mood if you don't have the proper amount of gut bacteria in there that we have research saying this okay and so they're going, well, we got strains of probiotics in AG1. Now, this is the original formula because their website is very, very trickily laid out.

11:09Victoria Song:And so I go there and I go like, okay, let me look at this peer research. You look at the graphs in this peer research that's linked there. Well, first of all, the sample size is 20, like what, 30 people? Negligible!

11:22Alex Cranz:Negligible! No, but just for the sake of argument, how many people do you generally want in a clinical trial?

11:28Victoria Song:Statistically, like 105 or so, like 100 people, we sometimes see that in a clinical trial. You want as many people that will be statistically significant for the population that you're studying.

11:40Alex Cranz:So you need a ton of people, different races.

11:41Victoria Song:30 people is not significant. 30 people is not significant.

11:46Ed:What is the population they're selling to? Everyone who might have tummy problems. Oh, I was like, if it's like dumbasses who exclusively get their medical advice from commercials on their Instagram and TikTok feeds. That's still a higher population than 30 people to be sick.

12:04Victoria Song:I was hoping I'm losing the ability to speak. I can't say statistically because I'm so mad. Listen, okay. I couldn't say Alex. I go through their little study. You have to go through the methodology. They're saying double blind, placebo controlled. Okay, that's great. gold standard sure whatever 30 people let me look at the graphs you know what's the graphs of the placebo and the pre and post ag1 use usage statistically the bars are the same is the change in the gut microbiome and in the room with us no it's not nothing oh they pooped a little more well i should hope so if you have fiber if you want to drink here's the thing if you want if

12:47Alex Cranz:you want to like have a better gut just have some greek yogurt in the morning it changed my life

12:51Victoria Song:Oh, you know what killed me? If you want to poop more, just eat grease. You want to kill me? The line that said there was an increase in these two strains of probiotics because it's an ingredient in AG1.

13:04Alex Cranz:Wait, so they increased, they measured something that they were adding. Okay.

13:11Victoria Song:Yes. That's like saying, we found corn in your poop because you ate corn.

13:17Alex Cranz:That's so cool. I, that's the thing I get targeted with these like mushroom coffee things or melatonin coffees or sleep coffee, like weird hot chocolate shit on it. There was a period when that was all they targeted me with and it didn't do shit. I refuse to do it. I'm not paying$30 for like five hot chocolates. Go fuck yourself. It's disgusting.

13:40Ed:Yeah, I spent$4 on biotin and it didn't do anything for my nails. So I do get it.

13:46Victoria Song:Okay, so here's the thing. Supplements are not regulated. So is the supplement that you're actually getting actually the supplement in an efficacious amount? I don't fucking know. I took 10 ,000 milligrams a day. If it's a proprietary blend, like AG1 uses proprietary blend, you don't know how much of each thing is in there. You just don't. You don't. Well, listen, if you're going to have greens powder because you want to kickstart your day and you want to have a healthy habit to start your day with, go off, queen. I love that for you. But to call it clinically backed, I find disingenuous. And I see this happen a lot in wellness.

14:33Ed:It's always there. They are the ones that backed the study, right? Like we see this a lot. They did pay for the study. They paid for it. I checked.

14:40Alex Cranz:That's also good.

14:41Ed:All the fake meets said, we're going to be the healthiest. We're going to be the best. We're going to be so good for you. And it was like, oh, who did the study? We did. Oh, did you do any studies that you didn't directly pay for?

14:52Victoria Song:No. I want to be fair. They did publish in peer-reviewed journals. And nine out of ten times, you are going to see people at least partially fund the study because it's very hard, especially in this climate, to get research funding for a truly independent peer-reviewed study. that's third party that has no affiliation with the company at all. It's good to look at it holistically with making sure they have really good methodology and that their findings make fucking sense based on their marketing. So if they were to be super honest about what they found, it would be like, you're not going to die from having AG1, and there's a potential that you might see some benefit.

15:35Alex Cranz:Well, I'm reading here that they— That's what it is. What is a nutritional gap? Because it claims that there is a nutrient, it helps. They demonstrated a statistically significant and positive impact on closing common nutrient gaps. This just means you didn't have enough of the nutrient?

15:53Victoria Song:Yes. So it's like you didn't have enough of your broccoli? Oh, so this is what else pisses me off. So that marketing site is just like the next gen of AG1 is clinically backed. And then you scroll all the way down to the peer-reviewed studies. And you're like, oh, look, look at these published peer-reviewed studies. That is for the old formula of AG1. And all those statistics that you just saw on that, that's for the new formulation of AG1. Guess how many peer-reviewed published studies they have on that? Zero. Because they only have abstracts that have been presented. And like abstracts, like I'm going through the abstracts and it's just like The sample size is, I think the largest sample size is like 120 people, but most of them are like 24 people who are healthy.

16:34Ed:Is this kind of like the FDA approval grift in wearables?

16:39Victoria Song:Okay, first of all, wearables are not FDA approved. They are FDA cleared because we approve drugs and we don't clear.

16:45Alex Cranz:All right, no, Victoria got explained. Sorry.

16:48Victoria Song:Because it's a marketing thing. Basically, you're just saying that it's adhered to a certain degree of safety and protocols. So, yes, you're going to be HIPAA compliant if your FDA cleared. You are going to have done some testing to make sure it's safe. And you only require this kind of clearance for class, I believe, class two medical devices or higher. Class two means intermediate risk. Class three is just like, oh, there's a significant risk in using this. And class one is like a tongue depressor. So you have some class one medical devices that are like the little stick that the doctor sticks in your mouth when you go.

17:23Victoria Song:Like that's a class one medical device in some cases. And those are just FDA listed. Like class one, FDA listed. Class two, FDA cleared. And then you have stuff like drugs, which must be FDA approved. So there is like a nuance to those particular meanings. But with wearables, to get the clearance process, it's for stuff like screening, right? So like you get an AKG and it says, we're not diagnosing you with atrial fibrillation, But homeboy, maybe go to a doctor and see if these things make sense. That is a cleared, generally, an FDA cleared feature. Because it's either a class, that's a class two feature, basically is what they're saying.

18:06Victoria Song:Now, if you don't want to do that because it's a very expensive process, you just go, it's wellness. Wellness isn't regulated because it's for your information only. Education is fun. So, Whoop, a couple of months ago, they had this blood pressure feature that they came out. And the way that this feature looked, it looked like it was telling you your systole and your diastolic and your systolic reading and telling you whether your blood pressure was high, medium, or low. And the FDA was like, ha-ha, no, you did not go through the clearance process for this. You're telling people what their blood pressure is.

18:41Victoria Song:And Whoop was like, ha-ha, no, this is a wellness feature. It's just for your education. And this wasn't meant to give you a reading. And the FDA was like, it kind of looks like a reading. It kind of looks like you're giving a diagnostic judgment. So that needs to go through the clearance process. And then Whoop was like, ha-ha, we disagree. Innovation. Yeah. And so then I just read a story on Politico today that Aura, the smart ring maker, is now lobbying in Washington to get a third category of devices. like a separate third category of classification called digital health screeners that wouldn't go through the very cumbersome clearance process, but would be more legit than wellness.

19:30Victoria Song:So, yeah.

19:31Ed:That makes sense, though. I don't know that that's going to make things clearer or easier.

19:36Victoria Song:I don't know.

19:38Ed:No, I think for the customer, for the consumer, we need a total radical rethinking of all of this because it's gotten complete. Like the plot. I think for the companies making a third device that's like, here are things that can identify but should never, ever be taken by themselves, should always be used in context with the doctor. Like the Oura Ring or the Whoop Band for blood pressure. I'm like, that kind of makes sense. It's just the line is already blurry.

20:09Victoria Song:I'm not hating enough. No, I feel like we're hating. The line is already blurry between wellness. What is a wellness? Like the blood pressure, not the blood pressure, the blood oxygen reading on your Apple Watch. What is that? Is that FDA cleared? Or is that a wellness?

20:25Alex Cranz:I think that anything that measures your body should have to be far more rigorously checked because I have a different reading on my Oura Ring, my Apple Watch, my headphones. Everything seems different. If I was relying on this information for anything other than punishing myself, I would be very worried. Like if I was sick in some way.

20:45Ed:Oh, yeah.

20:46Alex Cranz:Also, this whole aura being able to check if I'm sick thing, it has never caught it.

20:51Ed:It has once. It caught when I was really depressed once.

20:54Alex Cranz:I'm sorry. I shouldn't laugh at that.

20:57Ed:What did he say? I was hysterical. No, I got a note. I'm in bed at 2 o 'clock in the afternoon because, you know, depressed. sleeping. And I get a note and it's like, oh, you're having major symptoms. I'm like, yeah, no shit, Sherlock. I haven't gotten out of bed today. Thank you for joining. But like,

21:14Victoria Song:it just said my temperature. It's caught when I was coming down with something once. And then it caught when I was incredibly anxious another time. I was just like, oh, you think I'm sick? Well, I'm sick with anxiety. I'm just alive. That was one time. I'm just breathing.

21:33Ed:Honestly, I'm like, no, I'm just depressed. But honestly, thank you. Thank you for seeing depression as an illness or a ring. You were just like sick in the brain. It wasn't intentional. You were sick in the brain. That's what it was. Then I got out of bed. That's great. Do that.

21:45Alex Cranz:Yeah, but that was because it said you needed to stand up.

21:48Ed:Pretty much. I got like the text and I was like, time to get out of bed.

21:52Alex Cranz:Every time I see that note being like, you need to stand up, I genuinely want to fuck off. Every time. How dare you? My ass goes where my ass. I never stand up.

22:01Victoria Song:I'm currently standing up because I've been sitting too long. But again, this is my beat. So, yay.

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22:46Victoria Song:What if mind control is real?

22:49Ed:If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

22:52Victoria Song:Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car?

22:55Alex Cranz:When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings.

22:59Victoria Song:Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

23:02Alex Cranz:I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

23:06Victoria Song:Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. NLP, aka Neuro Linguistic Programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics, and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain.

23:22Alex Cranz:It's about engineering consciousness.

23:24Victoria Song:Mind Games is the story of NLP. its crazy cast of disciples, and the fake doctor who invented it at a New Age commune and sold it to guys in suits. He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all? NLP might actually work. This is wild. Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

23:52Alex Cranz:What do you do when the headlines don't explain what's happening inside of you. I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, it's where culture meets the soul, a place for real conversation. Each episode, I sit down with people from all walks of life, celebrities, thinkers, and everyday folks, and we go deeper than the polished story. We talk about what drives us, what shapes us, and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff, identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore, loss that changes you, purpose when success isn't enough, peace when your mind won't slow down, faith when it's complicated.

24:30Alex Cranz:Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out. If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

24:50Alex Cranz:China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.

25:40Alex Cranz:Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

26:09Ed:Mentally, physically, and everything in between is such garbage. Because, like, let me tell you something. You know what I've been doing for a while now? I've been messing with these AI guys. I love to have a chat with them. I love to be like, hey, this is what's going on in my life. How are we doing? How are you feeling?

26:24Alex Cranz:You took it to the chatbot in this case? Oh, yeah. Always in, like, the incognito mode so that it only saves a little bit of it.

26:32Ed:And then every time it, like, tells me to do something, and when I go back and tell it the next time in chat, it's forgotten, and I love it. Right, right. Highly recommend incognito mode. But it's terrible advice. The advice is consistently terrible. The advice is consistently like, treat yourself better. And it's like, I haven't gotten out of bed in three days. And it's like, you're doing okay. I love. I mean, I've gotten out of bed in three days. Doing great. But like, you know, you'd say something really extreme like that of like, clearly you're not doing okay. And it's like, hey, it happens to all of us.

27:01Ed:You just sit in bed for another week. And you're like, Claude? No. Claude, what are we doing? That's bad advice.

27:07Alex Cranz:It's also just the kind of shit advice you could get from literally anyone. Oh, I hadn't thought about feeling better when I felt sad. I've been deliberately feeling sad more because I thought that's what would make me feel better. Thank you, ChatGPT. It's just fucking bad.

27:25Ed:And then when you ask it, you ask it for, you're like, okay, I want to work on my fitness. V gives much better advice than God every single time. That's what your optimizer fancy line should be. I don't know what those are called. Tagline? But it needs to just be, yeah, tagline. Your tagline needs to be better advice than Claude or OpenAI when it comes to help.

27:49Alex Cranz:Well, did you see the ChatGPT ad for running? Oh, no. No, it was like, here's some running advice. And one of it's like, run with someone else, so you're accountable. Run three times a week. It's like, fucking hell. I'm so glad we are spending$50 ,000 of GPU on this bullshit.

28:05Victoria Song:There was a... Yeah, I was like, you can just get that by Googling. There was a Wall Street Journal article about Runa, which is an... They market themselves as an AI-powered running app, and they were acquired by Strava last year. If you're on Running Talk at all, you've probably seen people talk about Runa. It's massively popular. And the Wall Street Journal article was hilarious because it's like, people are getting injured using this because they just listen to the AI. And like I've used Runa and I have a very hard time sticking with that app because I find the program way too aggressive. So they came out with like a new mode that's like, hey, we made it less aggressive because a lot of you were getting injured and complaining.

28:45Victoria Song:And I was like, ha ha. It's almost like to use Runa properly. You also have to know when to ignore it, which is not the point of what they say AI should be. So I also hate AI and fitness.

29:00Alex Cranz:Well, I mean, it's also like the thing with fitness is even with a good routine, even with a good – like I have had to – I did the same routine for a year. I've had to pare it back because I kept getting injured because I'm getting older. Like you actually have to be able to like know when your body feels –

29:18Ed:That's the worst part of it is, yeah, like you want it to be like a trainer and it can talk to you like a trainer. Yeah, it can pretend to be one. It can give you that things. But the trainer is going to go, hey, I noticed you went really hard today and your knee's inflamed. Maybe take a break for the rest of the week.

29:34Victoria Song:A bad trainer will be like, no gain, no gain. I've had trainers do that to me before. But AI is always going to be a bad trainer. Yeah. Because it's not going to see it, right? I mean, they keep saying that they're going to make it better. I've yet to test an AI coach that I feel would give me the advice that I actually need. I have to sit there with myself and be like, oh, how are we feeling today in our body? Where are we feeling pain? Should I push it? I could push it. But what's my goal? You know, I have to have this conversation with myself in my head. How many of these constantly?

30:05Ed:AI coaches that you see are like actually programmed from the ground up to help with this. and how many are just large language models with, like the Aura one, right? Where it's just kind of like the large language model with a little bit of fanciness slapped on it. So you're like, oh, I'm not going to get anything.

30:23Victoria Song:Most of them are just Captain Obvious book report summaries.

30:26Alex Cranz:They're just prompts though, because you can't really, for you to do a trainer that was a specialized LLM, you would have to have a shit ton of words. And like a bunch of stuff.

30:37Victoria Song:Oh, they're all so fucking chatty too. I'm just like, Jesus Christ, You need to give me several less paragraphs about, like, I don't need this shit. And then you'll tell them, like, please stop being so chatty. Please be more concise. And they're like, oh, yeah. Okay, got it. Two prompts later, just an 800-word essay about your fitness.

30:54Ed:They hear you, and they want to gently push back on your plans for your exercising routine.

30:59Victoria Song:I just— Well, I mean, the best— I never get that. We have different AIs, clearly, but, like, it's just— Well, I just— Claude's so nice. Fuck Claude. I refuse to let them be nice to me. I say they are not allowed to be complimentary beyond 1%. I'm only allowed to get 1 % of complimenting from these dipshit bots.

31:18Ed:I'm using incognito mode. It remembers nothing. Right. It is incredible. So you'll tell it anything. It's going to forget from the next time. So you never program it. So Claude is always just like, hey, friend, I'm just like that one person who just sort of smiles and nods at you a lot. and like that's not very helpful I mean I don't for that it's not very helpful I just I don't I don't love it from like a usefulness standpoint I love it as like a sociological experiment does that make sense I guess makes more sense like I love to play with it and kind of be like oh what are you trying here what are you hoping to accomplish but nine times out of ten it does not actually help me every time I've had AI help me try to help me with fitness try to help me with sleeping better try to help me with writing garbage garbage

32:05Victoria Song:Because you're always getting regressed to the mean. And when it comes to health, well, we're going to go against the wellness versus the medical thing again. Because if they're giving you diagnostic advice, they could be liable for that. So they're only going to give you the most generic regression to the mean wellness advice that applies to everyone and is common sense. And it's like, well, if it's common sense, well, I didn't fucking need you to tell me it's common sense. That's why a lot of the AI fitness is just regurgitated book reports. It's the AI going like, hey, girl, you ran 3.1 miles today in this time.

32:39Victoria Song:That's faster than your other time. And yay, that's not what I need from you. Thank you, Pablo. My cat is screaming at me. But yeah.

32:50Alex Cranz:I just, I would never tell these things anything about myself. I just like I've naturally, my autism screener built into my brain just refuse. It's just like I cannot trust. I would never tell a website my secrets.

33:04Ed:I get that. I get that. And sometimes I just do. No, that's fine. I'm not a secret. I'm cognito mode. And I'm like, you know what? Let's hope you never leak the incognito mode stuff. Let's hope you're real.

33:16Alex Cranz:Yeah, but you also have your incognito mode, unless you're just like, I'm Alex Kranz. Let me tell you my life story.

33:20Ed:Yeah, every single time I'm like, hi, my name's Alex Kranz. Hello.

33:23Alex Cranz:Share some things.

33:24Ed:Look me up real fast. Okay, now let's chat.

33:29Alex Cranz:Yeah, I just. Also with fitness, like fitness has been a big part of my life for the last few years, especially. And it's like, the best advice I've got is from regular people who have been like, you're going too hard or just stop hurting yourself. That's the biggest thing. Not like I'm self-harming, but like, I would push myself too far. It would always be like, my wrist hurts. It's like, well, have you tried not fucking boxing, dickhead? And it's like, I don't think Chad GPT would say it. Mostly it's like friends of mine being like, yeah, you need to rest. because in my, I don't know, being a little personal here, in my head, I'm like, I should train more.

34:02Alex Cranz:I should lose weight. Like I push myself quite hard. A large language model telling me anything about that isn't going to help partly because I'll be like, I'm not, a website does not impress me. Like I don't trust your judgment. And also most of the time, the mean advice around lifting is dog shit. I'm so sorry, but the best lifting advice I ever got was lift volume, not heavy. And then people will be like, oh, I like lifting heavy things, put them back down. It's fine, but it's like, does not work for a lot of people I've met.

34:31Victoria Song:Oh, you mean you're not in the church of CrossFit progressive overload?

34:37Alex Cranz:What is that? I know about CrossFit, but I saw how they do pull-ups, and I just stopped listening to them.

34:46Victoria Song:Like, I'm not going to shit on CrossFit. They do some – it's very hard to say what CrossFit is. No, I have numerous friends who've used it. So I just -

34:53Ed:It's a philosophy of working out that is very different from a lot of other philosophies. Right. There we go. And it's really all about pushing yourself to your physical limits, which for some people, that can be a really useful thing. If you are over the age of 35, maybe be careful because you're going to hurt yourself.

35:16Victoria Song:I mean, and it's like -

35:16Ed:You're under the age of 35, go do your CrossFit.

35:19Victoria Song:I think CrossFit has like, because it's a franchise, and so each CrossFit gym can be very different. I think there's like a million different CrossFits out there, and it depends on which CrossFit person you know in your life as to what CrossFit they do. Some of them do the Marjorie Taylor Green version of CrossFit. Some of them do a much more reasonable version of it. I love her little pull-up. I think they're called kipping pull-ups or something. They look very silly.

35:47Alex Cranz:Those weird crossfit, the ones where you're just like, I'm going to break my fucking neck.

35:53Ed:Yeah. Oh, my God. It looks like the way I would try to do a pull-up as a child, and you'd be told no. It looks like not being able to do a pull-up. That's what it looks like. Because they're difficult.

36:05Victoria Song:It's an interesting look. But, yeah, no. So it's the other thing that I'm going to – back to the hate. Less thoughtfulness, more hate. I hate wellness influencers like not every wellness influencer there's some that are like not horrible and who actually talk about science and are quite responsible and like thoughtful in their wellness content they are not the majority the majority is just like oh my god I drink 81 every day and I have so much energy now or they'll be like oh my god come with what I eat in a day and it's just disordered eating or you know they're like protein protein protein protein max and it's like well protein is nice but you do need to eat your other macros and uh or you know it's just these little nuggets of science or nutritional um like best practices that get buried with disordered eating habits that get buried with pseudoscience that are just like not that helpful for people to know but it sounds real and then And, you know, because they are your parasocial friend, a lot of people start to trust them.

37:17Victoria Song:And then they start doing stupid things in their life. And these are all people who are just generally, by and large, mis - or underserved by the healthcare system. They don't want to go to a doctor who's going to dismiss their pain for the bazillionth time because that's the only thing that's affordable in their insurance network. But I just really hate that, one, influencers, whether they mean to or not, I'm sure some of them are well-meaning, whatever. They are profiting off of your discomfort and your search for something that's more affordable. I hate that. Because a lot of them don't take the time to do their due diligence.

37:51Victoria Song:And so they're taking sponsored money from these powders that you don't need objectively. But saying, oh, my God, this is how I cured everything holistically. Because I have to eat clean. What is eating clean? What does that mean? Wash your fucking vegetables.

38:04Alex Cranz:What does being clean mean?

38:07Victoria Song:It's like just eating healthy, but they're like, I eat clean. I don't eat processed foods. I don't eat sugar. I don't eat this. And you know, a little sugar in moderation is fine.

38:15Alex Cranz:You 100%. Everyone eats sugar. Yeah, there's no.

38:18Victoria Song:Everyone eats sugar. Or it's people who say like, oh my God, fruit has a high glycemic index, so it's bad for you. It's a fucking fruit. Like, it's fine.

38:27Ed:I once had a doctor. I was with a diabetic patient who's a family member. and I was once with them and the doctor was like, they can never eat a banana. And I was like, what if their blood sugar is low? Not with that attitude. They can't eat a banana. And I'm like, okay, so they just die? Like they can eat a banana. They just shouldn't eat it if their blood sugar is high or they're not thinking about it. But who is this culpable? Is it these fitness influencers or is it the entire industry, including the Googles and the YouTubes? It's the entire industry.

38:59Alex Cranz:I actually think it's one abstraction higher, which ties into AI as well, which is everyone wants a simple solution. They want to work out a way to lose weight that is not working out consistently and eating less calories. Though I realize it's not even as flat as that because everyone's body is kind of different. They want something that will give them a quick answer without them learning anything. They want a fitness plan that will tell them something they don't already know.

39:28Ed:It's called GLP-1. I could also just I'm going to hit you over the head No, GLP I mean I think GLP is on fucking rocks

39:36Alex Cranz:I think I think when it's used right

39:39Ed:and when it's used Yes, exactly when it's used You know what?

39:42Alex Cranz:If it's someone for weight loss and they're using it with the instruction of a doctor I think it's great Like it's just as long as as long as you're not just like I don't know getting it illegally off of TikTok and illegally is probably not the term Well, that's GLP 3

39:57Victoria Song:Well, no you can also go get I compounded versions of GLP-1, which are in a dubious state at this point in time, because it used to be okay to compound it. And then when there was a shortage, the FDA allowed that. And then once the shortage ended, they were like, no, no, no. So then these compounding pharmacies started altering the formula a little bit, adding a little bit of vitamin B12 or just different components in it so that they weren't carbon copies of what the pharmaceutical companies were like, hey, hey, hey, this is copyrighted, fuck off. But, you know, like that's also in of itself a problem because a lot of why are people going to these compounding pharmacies for their GLP-1s?

40:34Victoria Song:It's because insurance companies make you fit a very narrow criteria, even though it could potentially help you with a number of different things. Like we have to understand that GLP-1s are very recent for non-diabetic use. Like there's not a whole lot of data out there. Right? For not a year, but it's like in the span of medication, not that long. Like, you know, scientists study these things for a very long time. And I think we're about, what, a decade, 15 years on GLPs, less for the Manjaros and all that stuff. But it's like, you know, we don't – the vast majority of the clinical studies that have been done on these medications have been on obese or diabetic populations.

41:19Victoria Song:We don't know what a bodybuilder who is just taking this to like optimize themselves. We don't know what the impact on their bodies will be. We find some promising research with people with PCOS and fatty liver disease, which I have both of those, which is why my doctor is also like, you know, GLP makes sense for you and the metabolic dysfunction that you have. So it's not that doctors aren't using these in the arsenals to treat people who fit certain criteria, but there are people who could benefit from it who don't fit these arbitrary insurance criteria. And so we have created this market, this alternative market for them to go to that can be fine in some spaces if you do your research and you do your vetting and you find a legitimate compound pharmacy that follows the rules.

42:10Victoria Song:or you could get it from some gray market guy named Bobbo Timby and I don't know what you're putting in your body. So like we're creating these things because we have made things so restrictive, so bad. And then we are monetizing the alternative solution, which is ultimately giving a lot of health anxiety to people because why should they have to track their pee to know their hydration? Just look at the color of your pee. I don't know. Like, you know, instead of putting the systemic things in place that could help people with their health and marketing these as tools, it's like all of a sudden, oh, you can get your blood test because maybe you live in a rural area and you don't have time to go to the doctor.

42:53Victoria Song:So Aura will get your blood test for you, and now you can track your metabolites and your blood in the Aura app. With no doctor's advice? With no doctor's advice? Well, you could ask maybe the AI in the app or whatnot. And it's not just Aura. There's a lot of companies that are kind of pursuing this line. And it comes from a place of like, yes, there is a gap in the healthcare system. Traditionally, we're trying to fill that gap. And there are some people who that will help. I'm not going to lie and say that there's no people that that could benefit. But at the same time, the vast majority of healthy people don't need that.

43:24Victoria Song:They don't need that health anxiety in their life. But we're just putting it on them because it's like, well, if you don't, you're going to die. Right. And so it's just like, I would love for there to be more common sense in wellness. I would love us to have responsible conversations about whether or not you need to track X, Y, 70 biomarkers. You don't need to track 70 fucking biomarkers. You really don't.

43:47Alex Cranz:That data will not help you.

43:49Victoria Song:It won't. It won't.

43:52Ed:Is it kind of like, have you guys done it? Because I'm just curious, is it like when you go and you would pay to give someone all of your genetic material so they could test it to find out whether or not, like, what your family was, right? Like your family makeup?

44:08Victoria Song:We call it longevity tech, which is just another word for fucking bullshit. Sorry, wellness. Oh, yeah. But, like, it's this weird, you know, who is the bloody baroness who's bathing in the blood of virgins to appear younger and live longer? It's the same kind of fear from Silicon Valley where they're like, we are deathly afraid of death. So longevity tech. And you can optimize your life and you can study all these metrics about yourself. And then you'll be able to live a better, healthier life without having to go to the doctor as often. And it's just like there's a lot of problems with this narrative.

44:41Victoria Song:And you have Maha co-adopting it in some ways. I've seen health tech become weirdly right-wing over the last couple of weeks and months, where I'm just like, I don't know how I feel about this. I don't know how I feel about RFK Jr. going like every American wearable. I'm just like, why? It's post-alignment bullshit.

45:03Alex Cranz:We can't know everything. There is a world of mystery. And also, even knowing all of this stuff doesn't do anything. I've said this before on the podcast. I have four years of sleep data, if not more, and I cannot tell you anything. Other than generally, I sleep about seven and a half hours. No, that's my actual secret to all of this. The only reason I can put out 10 ,000 words a week is I sleep seven and a half to eight hours a night without fail. I prioritize sleep. And it's funny because it's like, of all the fitness things, sleep, supplement things, sorry, different supplements I've tried, weird tricks, sleep.

45:41Alex Cranz:I don't even mean it in like a facetious way I just mean like yeah this it's the one thing I can be like yeah when I do that I feel better when I don't sleep I feel way worse

45:50Victoria Song:I mean that's why they say sleep diet and exercise it just always boils down to like those three things and yes there are conditions that kind of make it difficult for certain people over others if you have metabolic dysfunction yeah well the diet part is going to be a little harder for you and there are treatments for that. That makes sense. But it fundamentally will always boil down to sleep, diet, and exercise.

46:39Alex Cranz:the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus only iHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business? Think iHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Let us show you at iHeartAdvertising.com. That's iHeartAdvertising.com.

46:58Victoria Song:What if mind control is real?

47:01Ed:If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

47:04Victoria Song:Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car?

47:07Alex Cranz:When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings.

47:12Victoria Song:Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

47:14Alex Cranz:I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

47:18Victoria Song:Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. NLP, a.k.a. neurolinguistic programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics, and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain.

47:34Alex Cranz:It's about engineering consciousness.

47:36Victoria Song:Mind Games is the story of NLP. its crazy cast of disciples, and the fake doctor who invented it at a New Age commune and sold it to guys in suits. He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all? NLP might actually work. This is wild. Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

48:04Alex Cranz:What do you do when the headlines don't explain what's happening inside of you. I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, it's where culture meets the soul, a place for real conversation. Each episode, I sit down with people from all walks of life, celebrities, thinkers, and everyday folks, and we go deeper than the polished story. We talk about what drives us, what shapes us, and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff, identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore, loss that changes you, purpose when success isn't enough, peace when your mind won't slow down, faith when it's complicated.

48:42Alex Cranz:Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out. If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

49:02Alex Cranz:China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside.

49:12Victoria Song:This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall.

49:16Alex Cranz:This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets. Listen to the Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

50:03Alex Cranz:I also want to be clear about something though because it was lost earlier we've had emails about it I think it's fine there were some people I've got emails from I forget when it was brought up in the past where it's like oh the judgment of people who use GLP to lose weight I think it's fucking I've had weight issues my whole life I think however people want to lose weight as long as it's done in a safe manner as long as it's done I'm on one

50:27Ed:I think it's fucking sick It's absolute magic.

50:30Alex Cranz:It's fucking cool.

50:31Ed:I love it. It makes sense for me.

50:33Alex Cranz:As long as it's not depriving diabetics of getting the things they need. Exactly, right? That's the one thing. Right?

50:38Ed:As long as the diabetics and people with metabolic issues who need it to survive are having it and we don't have a shortage, it's really great. For me, it's like, oh, I talk about it. I call it the wing index. We just had to hear about this before. There's something called the wing index.

50:53Victoria Song:We've talked about, yeah. The wing index. How many wings?

50:56Ed:How many wings do you eat before you were on a GLP one versus how many do you eat after? Because some of us, like, V and I were talking. I was like a 15-wing girly.

51:08Alex Cranz:Hell yeah.

51:09Ed:And now I'm a six. And I look at that and I'm like, that's sad. But then I'm like, was 15 good? No, it was delicious.

51:17Alex Cranz:It was wonderful. Yeah, I was going to say.

51:18Ed:It was the best thing in the world. Do I miss it?

51:21Victoria Song:My wing index. No. My wing index was four and now it's half of one. That's not great. I'm having a different experience with GLPs and Krances. It's a little more complicated. Because everyone's different. And also, I didn't want to be on one. I was told to be on one because of metabolic dysfunction was causing weight gain. And so I needed the extra help to kind of fix the metabolic dysfunction and reverse some negative trends in my liver. So that was like a very lengthy conversation I had with my doctor over three, four months. So, you know, it was an informed decision to go on it. And then as soon as I went on it, I started having clown nightmares.

52:06Victoria Song:And that was not fun. And I did not realize that's why I had nightmares.

52:11Ed:But yeah, apparently GLP-1 can create really vivid nightmares early on. I thought I was just having a moment. And V told me, and I was like, oh.

52:18Alex Cranz:I thought it was clown specific.

52:21Victoria Song:Oh no, I had a dream that my spouse's ex was chasing me on a cruise ship with a knife and I was like, this bitch is crazy. And then she turned into Pennywise the Clown from It. And I was like, oh no, she really crazy. And then I woke up almost screaming. And apparently it's because a small percentage of people who take GLP-1s have crazy dreams on them. And I was on the intro dose when I was getting these side effects. And my doctor was like, you know, most people don't get side effects on the intro dose. You are a special girl. And I was like, oh, cool. Great. So you're telling me that food aversion is not normal on the intro dose because I can't look at food sometimes.

53:05Victoria Song:And it's a very troubling.

53:08Alex Cranz:This is why I like the doctor I've had for the last few years in Vegas, because I don't get any of this normal people. I don't hear about the mean on the media. and I just did, he doesn't try and pretend that I am like similar to other people. Cause I am not like it. And most of the time it's just me being like, is this bad? And he's like, no, it's, I feel like the entire problem of everything we're talking about in these conversations is this trying to push everybody towards the mean, trying to make everyone like everyone else in a way that's literally not, I feel like the mean is also a terrible way to do health in general.

53:49Alex Cranz:Just the amount of food you need.

53:52Ed:It should be personalized. We're all different. Everybody's got different things. Some people got heart issues. Some people got fatty livers. Some people got the diabetes. Sorry, I'm of an age.

54:06Alex Cranz:The diabetes.

54:07Ed:I will always think of him every single time. Mr. Brimley. Yeah, Mr. Brimley. And, you know, everybody is a little different. And when we don't allow for that, when these fitness influencers and these companies push things and say, this is going to fix you, it's a flat-out lie. Because they don't know, and they can't promise that, and they shouldn't. And, like, I know we're kind of going all through it. I still get really upset with the companies like Google who are profiting enormously off of this stuff. They have no issue just raking in billions in cash from advertisers and from these influencers and from viewpoints just to make a buck.

54:49Ed:They're just like, yeah, this is just an industry. You are the product now.

54:51Victoria Song:I hate that. I hate that you are the product now. Your attention is a product. Your body is a product. Everything about you is being monetized to be a product. And it's like, you don't do the buying anymore. You are the data. like smart glasses. Why do they want to put cameras on these smart glasses so that they can get data from the camera?

55:10Ed:No, it's because everybody always wants to record their first-person point of view. Of course. Which looks like shit. That's what the commercial said.

55:18Alex Cranz:It looks like boiled ass. Here's a hater moment. I think the video from those things looks weird. I think it looks strange. I don't like it. I feel like I'm sitting on top of somebody's head.

55:32Victoria Song:I mean, because you are.

55:34Alex Cranz:Yeah, I mean, I know that's why. But that's not a pleasant feeling. I don't want to be Ratatouille.

55:41Ed:Just like the vertical video wasn't attractive, right? Still isn't. Now we're all used to vertical video.

55:47Alex Cranz:I like my 69 situation, 1610. Oh, yeah.

55:51Ed:I want to see everything around you.

55:54Alex Cranz:I want a classic wide frame. Yeah, it's just, I am really, I do think we're going to, No one fucking believes me, but I do think a lot of this stuff is going to go away the moment they realize how actually expensive it is to run this shit. And on top of the fact that just no one's really making any money out of this AI health stuff because where's the product? It's like, yeah, I asked you. You are the product. Yeah, but like you're getting on, but they don't know how to productize it from there. They don't know how to like make a ton of money from that. Evidence being that nobody has made a ton of money from that.

56:30Alex Cranz:Even Claude Code, the supposedly most important thing ever that isn't, only about$100 million a month in revenue. Andrew Huberman probably makes that from various snake oils he boils in his garage.

56:44Victoria Song:The thing about health, though, it is the most valuable thing you have. I think Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said something along these lines several years ago, and it's stuck in my brain, where it's just like you will most people unless you know most people right will basically do anything to live a little bit longer that's rich people that's poor people nobody wants to die i mean like there's a few select there's a select few who uh court death for whatever reason but most people don't want to die they want just a little bit more time and so health is your most valuable possession that you have.

57:23Victoria Song:It's priceless because as soon as your health goes, your quality of life goes. And I think companies know this and they know if they can scare you, if they can fear monger you into saying, we have a solution so that you will live longer, people will pay out the nose for that. And they're just waiting to get that thing that will be like, oh, you will do this. Like smartwatches, when it was just counting your steps, didn't fucking matter. They were having a hard time getting people to buy those things. The fashion, Apple Watch edition, yeah, that didn't work either. But as soon as the Apple Watch was like, well, save your life if you have a cardiac event, yeah, people started buying them.

57:59Victoria Song:They started becoming a thing.

58:00Alex Cranz:That was kind of cool, though, like it could do the EKG thing, but I'm sure that there's something there.

58:05Ed:I would argue Apple is a big reason why we have this. I mean, obviously, there's like the Alex Jones and the Joe Rogans of the world and everything like that, and the whole influencer their economy and love to push through your protein powders. But a big part of this was Apple. This is my hater section. A big part of this was Apple. When Apple came out, they launched that watch. It did fuck all. Nobody knew what to use it for. I had one. I called it my great regret, capital letters, every single time, even when I said it out loud. And that was because it was useless. And they were desperate to find a use for it.

58:38Ed:They found a use with the EKG stuff. And it was a genuinely useful thing, people started buying it for that reason, right? I cannot tell you how many people I know who bought a watch for an elderly parent so that they could have that extra safety net. And now they're like, okay, well, we still have to make money off of this, but we already did that and we have to grow. And we have to keep growing. If we don't grow, we die. And so what do they do? They push further into wellness in places where Apple and a lot of these companies have zero business being and they're doing it exclusively because they're like we need new markets to sell

59:13Victoria Song:our products and that's it i will say apple is much more responsible in the wellness space than other they do a lot in clinical research they are very clear about what their products do and don't do i do not hate apple as much in this space as other no that's kind of more snake oily um uh which macallot but they did they kick it off they kicked off the advanced health features but like Like, that's the, again, here's the difference. Here's the distinction. Health features versus wellness features, they're different. They're different. There's a different grade.

59:47Ed:Isn't Apple one of the ones who did push wellness because some of their features couldn't, weren't immediately approved, weren't being like, yeah, they just weren't approved. And so they were like, oh, this is a wellness feature initially.

59:59Victoria Song:Well, it was more like, they were, I wouldn't say it was them that were the first ones because EKG, I think, was the first time we saw like a big difference. In terms of like the alerts, anything that is diagnostic, they very much go through the, it's not diagnostic, but anything that's diagnostic adjacent, they will go through the clearance process for. But again, to answer the question I asked you guys earlier, blood oxygen, that's a wellness feature because there's nothing that you do with that information. It's just a spot check. It's not telling you that you have sleep apnea. It's not telling you that you have anything.

1:00:30Victoria Song:It is for your fun that you get to see that what your blood oxygen is. And so that is a wellness feature. And okay, cool.

1:00:37Ed:Apple risks a lot of time and effort and lawsuits to put into their watches and are now, aren't they still embroiled in a lawsuit about it?

1:00:47Victoria Song:They're still embroiled in a lawsuit about it, but they're no longer banned from importing it. So, you know, you can still have those features on the thing. But, you know, blood oxygen I don't think is that useful of a metric. If you need it, just get a pulse oximeter. I don't think a smartwatch is. You know, I've had some readers tell me that they find it useful for their parents with respiratory issues, but I just think you should have a pulse oximeter because this is going to be a gruesome story. But when my mom was dying, like actually the day she died, it was because she was having respiratory failure from ALS.

1:01:21Victoria Song:Her lungs were paralyzed, basically, and she couldn't breathe and get enough oxygen into them. So her blood oxygen was dropping rapidly. And, you know, I had the pulse oximeter, and she was getting to a point where her blood saturation levels were, like, in the high 40s to low 60s, which is death time. Because anything under 90, you're supposed to go to a hospital. So, you know, that was—my family's full of doctors, so this was supervised, right? My family's full of doctors, and they all knew what that meant. And, you know, I'm a wearables reporter. My cousin was freaking out. She's off the pulse oximeter Couldn't possibly be saying 48 Because that meant death So I was like well I got Apple Watch Let me put this on my dying mother And let me tell you It couldn't read it There was no reading

1:02:10Alex Cranz:Fucking hell

1:02:10Victoria Song:Did it put up an emoji or anything? No it just said it couldn't get a reading No she put it on and it immediately said

1:02:18Alex Cranz:You should try standing

1:02:20Victoria Song:Yeah I mean like this This is not a story that I frequently tell just because it's a sad story. And then I'm also just like, I feel guilt because I'm just like, oh, I put an Apple Watch on my mom while she was the scientist. No, no, no, no, bullshit.

1:02:34Alex Cranz:You tried to confirm something. You actually tried. You were trying to confirm. Also, your mother was dying. You could have done anything in that case. You reacted more normally than I would if such a thing was happening.

1:02:50Victoria Song:Don't worry, I reacted not normally later that night.

1:02:53Alex Cranz:Again, completely forgivable considering. Yeah, yeah. Be kinder to yourself.

1:02:59Victoria Song:But no, I was just very much like, well, what are the opportunities for a wearables tester to be with someone who is very identifiably below 90 in terms of a pulse oximeter and to see whether this feature actually works on someone who is so low? And my finding was, no, this is why you need a pulse oximeter. Because if you are someone who has to worry about that, you shouldn't really rely on a smartwatch wellness. Clearly con.

1:03:28Ed:It's the same with like, I was going to say, same dark store, similarly dark, but my mom's still alive. But she had a stroke and had to go on a heart monitor. And she was like, well, why can't I just use my Apple Watch? Because it's got AFib detection. And they were like, because it's a garbage heart rate monitor. You need one like over your heart. We want to see every beat of that thing. Your wearables aren't going to do that. And her mind was blown. And she hated it. And we ended up using the Apple Watch.

1:03:56Victoria Song:It's only for healthy people with a baseline. Like, that's all these wearables are. It's just establishing what your baseline is. And, like, accuracy is actually not the most important thing for most wearables. It's consistency. So if it's consistently inaccurate by the same amount, you can still use it to judge changes in your baseline. But yeah, obviously I live and breathe this shit. So I get really mad when I see influencers just talking out their fucking ass about clinically backed this. And they're like, it's clinically proven. Nothing's clinically proven. Clinically proven doesn't mean shit.

1:04:30Victoria Song:It's a marketing term. Especially, you know, I actually interviewed a doctor and I was just like, what is clinically whatever meant? And then she was just like, there's a whole wide range of what clinically backed or clinically tested means. It could be in certain cases, depending on how a study is designed, it could be someone just self-reporting their results in a scientific setting. And that is technically clinical. So, you know, next time you hear clinically validated, clinically proven and marketing materials, I want you to put your little thinking cap on and go, but is it really? Is it really?

1:05:09Victoria Song:What does that mean? Look, what does that mean? What are they actually studying? How are they validating this thing? Like, I just want you to take the extra critical thinking step and just don't go like, wow, science words. Like, that's all I want for people to next time you see an influencer in a Lululemon set going, oh, my God, this greens powder is clinically proven to help your cognition. No.

1:05:35Ed:that gets into that whole four humors thing we've been seeing where everybody's talking about your cortisol and all your other different hormones and if I hear one more time someone talking about inflammation I was like if it was this easy to release our cortisol no one would have stress you know how you get rid of cortisol lower your cortisol levels be less stressed and exercise that's it

1:06:01Alex Cranz:I've been getting random itching when I fall asleep and I've read so many things like, yeah, maybe you're stressed. It's like, cool, thank you.

1:06:09Victoria Song:You have dry skin, moisturized. Do you moisturize, Ed? Yeah, I do.

1:06:14Alex Cranz:I do and it doesn't work. So, I mean, it's probably something fun. Someone's going to email me. If you email me and say it's like a, just want to be clear, any listeners who email and try and diagnose me, I don't want to fucking know and I'm going to blast you. Everyone email him and tell him he's amlactin. any kind of diagnosis, I must be fucking clear. I will light you up like a Christmas tree. And on that note, I think we can call it there as we've had a wonderful hater session. Victoria Song, of course, from The Verge. Victoria, always a pleasure to have you.

1:06:49Victoria Song:Thank you for having me. I hate everything.

1:06:52Alex Cranz:And Alex Granz, love having you too.

1:06:55Ed:Oh my God. I hated every part of this podcast. and in every part of the world right now. Did I get my hate up? Perfect. That was great.

1:07:06Alex Cranz:The hate-o-meter I've got going is absolutely losing it.

1:07:09Ed:But this was lovely.

1:07:10Alex Cranz:Thank you, everyone, for listening. This has been lovely. You'll have monologue, of course, this week. And yeah, catch you soon.

1:07:23Alex Cranz:Thank you for listening to Better Offline. The editor and composer of the Better Offline theme song as Matosowski. You can check out more of his music and audio projects at matosowski.com. M-A-T-T-O-S-O-W-S-K-I.com. You can email me at ez at betteroffline.com or visit betteroffline.com to find more podcast links and of course my newsletter. I also really recommend you go to chat.wheresyoured.at to visit the discord and go to r slash betteroffline to check out our reddit. thank you so much for listening

1:07:56Ed:Better Offline is a production of Cool Zone Media for more from Cool Zone Media visit our website coolzonemedia.com or check us out on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts

1:08:28Alex Cranz:This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. In 2018, the FBI took down a ring of spies working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world. The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets. Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:08:58Victoria Song:I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we unpack the story of an unimaginable tragedy that gripped the UK in 2023. But what if we didn't get the whole story?

1:09:11Alex Cranz:I've just been made to fit. The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapsed.

1:09:15Victoria Song:What if the truth was disguised by a story we chose to believe? Oh my God, I think she might be innocent. Listen to Doubt, The Case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:09:28Ed:What if mind control is real? If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have? Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car?

1:09:37Alex Cranz:When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings.

1:09:41Ed:Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

1:09:44Alex Cranz:I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

1:09:47Ed:Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. Mind Games, a new podcast exploring NLP, a.k.a. neurolinguistic programming. Is it a self-help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:10:08Alex Cranz:You can scroll the headlines all day and still feel empty. I'm Ben Higgins, and If You Can Hear Me is where culture meets the soul. honest conversations about identity loss purpose peace faith and everything in between celebrities thinkers everyday people some have answers most are still figuring it out and if you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story this show is for you listen to if you can hear me on the iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts this is an iheart podcast

1:10:41Victoria Song:guaranteed human