Democracy Was Built To Elevate Psychopaths - Alex Tarnava - #66

Everything You Think You Know About Vikings Is Wrong — Martyn Whittock - #69

Martyn Whittock is a historian, author, and former educator with over 35 years of teaching medieval history, and the author of American Vikings and Vikings in the East. What was a Viking? Not a people, a nation, or a religion — but a job description. The Norse exploded out of Scandinavia for three centuries, raiding from Lindisfarne to Baghdad, yet within two generations almost everywhere they landed, they became the locals. So what actually triggered the Viking Age, why did the most feared warriors in history convert to Christianity so fast, and what did a Danish conquest in 1016 have to do with the Norman invasion of 1066? Expect to learn why "Viking" described what you did rather than who you were, what an 8th-century Islamic silver famine had to do with the sack of Lindisfarne, why everything we think we know about Norse religion was written by a 13th-century Christian, why the Blood Eagle almost certainly never happened, how the Great Heathen Army stopped going home and changed England forever, why 1016 matters more than 1066, and much more… - Save hundreds on the best saunas on the market: HERE [https://www.heavenlyheatsaunas.com/MERRILL] (use code MERRILL) Save on an amazing cold plunge: HERE [https://nordicwave.pxf.io/WOG6E3] (use code MERRILL) - Thank You For Listening To The Chase Merrill Podcast - Get in touch in the comments below or head: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/chasecmerrill/] - Martyn's Instagram: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/martynwhittock/] - 0:00 What Is a Viking, Actually? 4:23 What Triggered the Viking Age 9:39 Why Silver Ruled the Viking World 11:41 Lindisfarne: The 9/11 of the Viking Age 21:27 The Longship Advantage 28:28 Valhalla and the Will to Fight 31:04 Everything We Know About Norse Religion Is Wrong 37:28 Why Vikings Converted in One Generation 43:51 The Blood Eagle and the Berserkers 50:06 The Great Heathen Army 1:02:06 120 Longships on Paris 1:05:40 Ragnar Lothbrok: Real or Legend? 1:10:58 Cnut: The Invasion Everyone Forgot 1:32:21 Vikings in America 1:37:10 Closing Questions

Your Microbiome Is Going Extinct, Generation By Generation - Kiran Krishnan - #68

What's actually happening inside your gut? Modern diets, over-sterilized environments, and decades of bad supplement advice have quietly dismantled the microbiome that runs almost every system in your body — from your immune system to your brain. So what does a genuinely healthy microbiome look like, and what does it actually take to rebuild one? Expect to learn why 80% of gut-brain communication travels from gut to brain rather than the other way, how 40 grams of daily fiber cuts all-cause mortality by 40% (and why that would be a trillion-dollar pill if you could patent it), why the "kill the bad bacteria first" strategy has always been wrong, what leaky gut and LPS actually are and why one paper named them the number one driver of mortality and morbidity worldwide, why 98% of probiotics on store shelves are dead before they reach your intestines, and how our microbiome diversity has collapsed from 800–900 species in our ancestors to an average of 120 today and much more… - Save hundreds on the best saunas on the market: HERE [https://www.heavenlyheatsaunas.com/MERRILL] (use code MERRILL) Save on an amazing cold plunge: HERE [https://nordicwave.pxf.io/WOG6E3] (use code MERRILL) - Thank You For Listening To The Chase Merrill Podcast - Get in touch in the comments below or head: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/chasecmerrill/] - Kiran's Instagram: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/kiranbiome/] - 0:00 The Other Brain: Why The Gut Runs Your Body 6:03 What Is "Gut Health"? Defining the Microbiome Spectrum 9:13 It's Daily Choices, Not Miracle Supplements 13:48 Reading The Signs: What Your Body Is Telling You 19:32 Your Gut Controls Your Immune System (Treg Cells and the Nobel Prize) 21:04 How To Build Gut Diversity With Food and Fiber 24:23 The Diet War: Why Picking A Camp Makes You Untrustworthy 32:44 Meal Hygiene: How You Eat Matters As Much As What You Eat 41:49 Why "Kill The Bad Bacteria" Is The Worst Gut Health Advice 47:35 Probiotics vs Prebiotics vs Postbiotics: What You Actually Need 54:29 Leaky Gut, LPS, and The #1 Driver of Chronic Disease 1:00:30 The Mass Extinction Of The Western Microbiome 1:08:24 High Protein, Rotten Farts, and Fasting: The Complete Picture 1:15:47 Closing Questions

You Suffer More In Thought Than In Action - Solo Episode - #67

What's actually stopping you from doing the thing? It's not your schedule, your energy, or the weather — it's the gap between the idea and the action. The cold plunge is always worse from the outside looking in. So what does standing next to a 40-degree tank each day teach you about starting a podcast, finishing a 100-day challenge, or building something before anyone's watching Expect to learn why novel inconvenience can feel easier than boring consistency, how Naval Ravikant's theory of entropy reframes falling off a routine, which recovery tools actually earn their place and which are better suited for beginners, why "how you do anything is how you do everything" might be making you worse, what actually changed in my diet after talking with Dr. Joel Fuhrman, and much more… - Save hundreds on the best saunas on the market: HERE [https://www.heavenlyheatsaunas.com/MERRILL] (use code MERRILL) Save on an amazing cold plunge: HERE [https://tidd.ly/4fqqzf1] (use code MERRILL) - Thank You For Listening To The Chase Merrill Podcast - Get in touch in the comments below or head: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/chasecmerrill/] - 0:00 Intro: Why Solo Episodes Are Hard 1:10 The 100-Day Challenge 2:45 A Bear In The Campsite 5:15 Mundane Beats Novel 10:20 You Suffer More In Thought Than In Action 13:50 Month In Review: Guest Episode Highlights 20:45 Q&A: Which Recovery Tools Actually Earn Their Place 24:10 How My Relationship With Sleep Changed 25:50 How To Defog Your Mind 28:00 Did Joel Fuhrman Actually Change How I Eat 29:25 Why I Started This Podcast 31:43 How I Choose Guests 32:50 The Loneliness of Building Before Anyone's Watching 36:09 The Belief I Had To Abandon 39:55 Getting Back On Routines and Closing Book Rec

Democracy Was Built To Elevate Psychopaths - Alex Tarnava - #66

Alex Tarnava is a health researcher, inventor of molecular hydrogen tablets, and author. What's happening to human capacity? Society is telling people to specialize, comply, and trust institutions — but the systems running our lives may be designed, even if unintentionally, to produce weaker, more exploitable people. So what's actually been engineered into our education, our corporations, and our democracy, and what would it take to build something better? Expect to learn why stress is only beneficial when you can recover from it, how modern AI is designed to be the world's greatest sycophant and what that's doing to your thinking, why democracy's structure of short time horizons guarantees corrupt leaders, the 1919 court ruling that stripped ethics from every major corporation, why leaving a Western country costs more proportionally than Roman slaves paid for their freedom, the clinical evidence behind molecular hydrogen and telomere lengthening in elderly populations, and much more… - Save hundreds on the best saunas on the market: HERE [https://www.heavenlyheatsaunas.com/MERRILL] (use code MERRILL) Save on an amazing cold plunge: HERE [https://tidd.ly/4fqqzf1] (use code MERRILL) - Thank You For Listening To The Chase Merrill Podcast - Get in touch in the comments below or head: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/chasecmerrill/] - Alex's Instagram: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/alextarnava/] Alex's website: HERE [https://alextarnava.com/] - 0:00 Stress Hacking: Why Both Extremes Are Wrong 1:06 Stress Only Builds When You Can Recover From It 8:41 Hard Times Make Strong Men (And How To Shortcut It) 15:01 AI Is The Greatest Sycophant Ever Created 21:32 AGI's Impossible Dilemma: Slavery or Extinction 24:16 The 1919 Ruling That Captured Every Corporation 28:06 How Education Accidentally Elevates Psychopaths 31:46 Why Democracy Guarantees Corrupt Leaders 36:49 Leaving Your Country Costs More Than Roman Slaves Paid for Freedom 43:57 What Better Governance Could Actually Look Like 51:54 Why Men Were Told To Forget Their Purpose 58:42 Building Resilience Without Burning Out 1:03:11 Hydrogen: The Missing Nutrient 100,000 Years in the Making 1:09:54 Echo Chambers Are Making Your Mind Weak 1:16:43 Book Rec and Closing Questions

Your Brain Is Not You - Dr. Lee Warren - #65

Dr. Lee Warren is a neurosurgeon, Iraq War veteran, podcast host, and author of four books, including The Life-Changing Art of Self-Brain Surgery. What if the thing controlling your thoughts, habits, and emotions isn't who you really are? For decades, science taught us that genes and brain chemistry write our futures — that we're stuck with the minds we were given. But the latest neuroscience tells a different story. So what does it actually mean that your mind and brain are separate things, and how much of your life can you still rewrite? Expect to learn why your brain and your mind are not the same thing, how neuroplasticity lets you structurally rebuild your brain in real time simply by changing what you think about, why 80% of your automatic thoughts are biased or outright false, the real timeline for breaking old habits and wiring in new ones, how Dr. Warren rebuilt his life after losing his son at 19, why alcohol is a class-one carcinogen with no safe dose for the brain, and much more… - Save hundreds on the best saunas on the market: HERE [https://www.heavenlyheatsaunas.com/MERRILL] (use code MERRIL Save on an amazing cold plunge: HERE [https://tidd.ly/4fqqzf1] (use code MERRILL) - Thank You For Listening To The Chase Merrill Podcast - Get in touch in the comments below or head: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/chasecmerrill/] - Dr. Lee's Instagram: HERE [https://www.instagram.com/drleewarren/] Dr. Lee's website: HERE [https://wleewarrenmd.com/] - 0:00 Your Brain Is Not You 3:02 Genetic Determinism Is Dead 10:26 You Need Hard Things to Survive Hard Things 14:08 How Lee Became a Neurosurgeon 17:08 200 Surgeries in a Tent 28:52 Coming Home With PTSD 31:17 How Writing Healed What War Left Behind 37:02 Losing Mitch: One Death Can't Kill Two People 40:32 The fMRI Scanner That Changed Everything 52:47 What Is Self-Brain Surgery? 57:59 How Long Does It Take to Rewire Your Brain? 1:16:59 Feelings Aren't Facts — They're Chemical Events 1:22:19 What a Neurosurgeon Actually Does for Brain Health 1:31:00 Closing Questions