In this episode, Laurel and Sarah are joined by Dr. Joe Schwarcz, Director of the Office for Science and Society at McGill University and one of the most experienced science communicators working today. They explore why pseudoscientific health claims spread so effectively, even among educated and well-intentioned people, and why wellness culture is so drawn to simple explanations for complex biological problems.

The conversation moves through three dominant narratives shaping modern health messaging: the obsession with finding a single root cause, the moralization of food, chemicals, and health behaviors, and the pressure to optimize every biological variable imaginable. Dr. Schwarcz explains how these narratives distort public understanding of science, create unnecessary anxiety, and distract from the few behaviors that reliably matter for health, like movement, nutrition, and basic risk management.

They also discuss how science actually works, including why it changes over time, how peer review can fail, how industry funding complicates research interpretation, and why cherry-picked studies and observational data are so easily weaponized in marketing. The episode closes with practical guidance on how to evaluate health claims, how to think about trust and expertise, and why asking better questions is often more powerful than finding definitive answers.

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RESOURCES

Dr. Schwarz's radio show

McGill University blog

McGill University YouTube

Book: The Certainty Illusion, by Timothy Caulfield

In this solo episode, Sarah takes the “doctor vs brand” framework that went viral on Instagram and runs it as a real-time case study on a real company. The target is Cadense, an adaptive shoe that claims to help with foot drop, toe catch, and neurologic walking difficulties using “variable friction” tech, basically a glide-to-grip outsole design meant to reduce toe snagging while still giving traction during stance and push-off. Sarah breaks down what foot drop is, who this type of device might help, who it might put at risk, and why any rehab-adjacent product should be judged on more than vibe, testimonials, or white-coat authority.

Then she gets into incentives, the part everyone wants to ignore until it’s their wallet. She walks through Cadense’s ambassador, coach, and affiliate pathways, and uses the full checklist to evaluate where Cadense lands on the clinician-led spectrum, including what they disclose well, what they oversimplify, and what they should tighten up if they want to be truly “do no harm” about a product that can literally change someone’s fall risk. Finally, Sarah looks at the actual research (yes, it exists, no, it’s not robust yet), explains what a five-person pilot study can and can’t prove, and lays out the line she personally won’t cross, recommending a product case-by-case versus becoming financially tied to a medical-ish purchase decision.

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RESOURCES
Instagram Post: When a Doctor Becomes a Brand
Cadense, Official Website
Cadense Coaches Program, Clinician Partnership
Pilot Study of Cadence, A Novel Shoe for Patients With Foot Drop, Evora et al. 2019
NIH Clinical Trial, Variable Friction Shoe vs AFO (NCT06234124)
Global Wellness Economy Reaches $6.8 Trillion, Global Wellness Institute

In this episode of the Movement Logic Podcast, Laurel Beversdorf revisits the advice to eat 30 different plants per week and explains why it sounds scientific while resting on a much shakier foundation than it appears. She reflects on encountering the claim, why her and Sarah’s initial reaction was skepticism, and how listener feedback led to a closer look at where the idea came from and how it spread.

Laurel breaks down what the American Gut Project actually showed: an observational association between self reported plant variety and gut microbiome diversity in a specific, self selected, largely affluent cohort. She explains why this type of research cannot identify an optimal number of plants or justify turning a statistical cutoff into a universal lifestyle rule, especially given the limits of how plant intake was measured.

She then examines how the venture backed consumer health company Zoe translated this association into a prescriptive target and built products around it, arguing that the clarity and certainty of the message functions as marketing rather than sound, science backed health advice. Finally, Laurel zooms out to the emotional and social impact of this advice, explaining how moralized wellness claims turn health into a performance metric while ignoring access, instability, and other social determinants of health.

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RESOURCES

113: Debunking Menopause Grifters

118: How Should We Eat To Be Healthy? with Abby Langer, RD

102: Moralizing Movement

American Gut Project

McDonald, 2018; PMID: 29795809

Book: The Certainty Illusion, by Timothy Caulfield

Guardian Article: ‘Personalising stuff that doesn’t matter’: the trouble with the Zoe nutrition app

Zoe + Science + Nutrition interview with Prof. Tim Spector

Post: Dr. Lauren Colenso-Semple's infographic on scientific process

Post: What Peter Attia gets wrong

Post: Attia & 30 plants/week

Post: Doctor vs. Brand