The Andrew Huberman controversy, explained

Andrew Huberman is a neuroscientist best known for his podcast covering different research in all fields of scientific study. However, it isn’t his wildly successful podcast that’s gotten his name in the headlines.

Huberman had been working in neuroscience for around a decade before he began his journey to fame. Back in 2021 he was convinced by fellow scientist and podcaster Lex Fridman to start a podcast and, with that, the Huberman Lab was born. As of 2023, it’s one of the most listened to podcasts in the US on Spotify, Andrew’s show is the most followed on Apple Podcasts and he has over five million followers on both his YouTube and Instagram accounts. 

Huberman is incredibly well-liked, his podcast episodes are often hours long, and in an age where people’s attention spans are dwindling, being able to get people to listen to anything for that long is an incredible feat. Although some have been a little bit critical of how he often makes claims based on weak studies on his show. But that isn’t the major controversy today, as details about Huberman’s personal life have now come to light, exposing a pattern of manipulation, infidelity, and generally strange behavior.

What did Andrew Huberman do?

The news broke on March 25th after an article published in the New York Magazine’s Intelligencer detailed the multiple relationships that Huberman had been juggling for quite some time. The article speaks to Huberman’s girlfriend, “Sarah” (which isn’t her real name), and the other women he cheated with as well as some friends of the scientist who all noticed that he was often incredibly flakey, planning events and canceling at the last minute, and sometimes just straight up disappearing.

You would have been forgiven for thinking that Huberman was just poorly organized, but it turns out that the opposite was the truth. He was seeing at least five different women across the United States all at the same time, the time management and organization taken to see that many people and keep all secret would be impressive if it weren’t such a horrible thing to do to someone. It only gets worse when you hear that his cheating may have possibly resulted in a sexually transmitted infection in one of his partners.

This of course explained a lot, it turns out Huberman would sleep with women back to back. They compared texts and worked out the timeline. One particularly shocking example was a day when he left his girlfriend in Berkeley, flew another girl from Texas to L.A. to stay with him in Topanga and while she was visiting he left her briefly to meet with a third girl to discuss their “relationship.” I’m imagining him running around like Tom Ripley, casually spinning a web of deceit.

According to Sarah, Huberman’s behavior while the two were together was also incredibly toxic. He would often direct his rage towards Sarah, frequently belittling her and her life choices such as focusing on her decision to have children with another man before the two were even together.

While his podcast may be doing better than ever, it seems like his personal life is a bit of a mess. His behavior comes as a surprise to many but no one is probably more shocked than the girls he strung along for months.