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4 quotes from 1 episode on Huberman Lab, each with a timestamped link to the source.
Michael Pollan states the brain exists to keep the body alive and receives communication through physical feelings. Daily caffeine habits reverse withdrawal to restore a baseline state, making individuals feel more normal on a drug.
The brain exists to keep the human body alive and relies on feelings to receive communication from physical organs.
“The brain exists to keep the body alive. We forget that we often think the body you because we love the brain. You know, we're cerebrocentric in so many ways and the body has to communicate with the the brain and it does it through feelings.”
From Why Your Gut Dictates Your Decisions: The Somatic Brain
Removing a daily substance reveals that an individual often feels more normal while taking a drug.
“After a couple days, the symptoms started to subside. And I finally got to this point where I had no caffeine in my system and I wasn't having tea either. And but even then I didn't feel like myself. And I thought, well, isn't that weird? You feel more yourself on a drug than not on the drug.”
From Michael Pollan on Caffeine, Resetting Baseline, and Tolerance
Roughly 80% of vagus nerve signals travel from the body up to the brain. Because of this connection, people who calm their stomachs with ginger express less severe moral judgment toward others.
“And the people who had taken the ginger were less judgmental because their stomachs were calmed. Ginger calms the stomach. And so the emotion of moral disgust is somehow we are passing it through. We're doing a gut check on it.”
From Why Your Gut Dictates Your Decisions: The Somatic Brain
Roughly 90% of adults consume caffeine daily. Regular consumption reverses acute withdrawal to bring individuals back to their default state, functioning as an addiction that maintains a pharmacological identity.
“Getting back on caffeine is very different than the daily experience of getting to baseline, which is essentially what you're doing with an addiction like that…”
From Michael Pollan on Caffeine, Resetting Baseline, and Tolerance
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