Good calories versus bad calories. If you go down the Joe Rogan Experience rabbit hole and reach 2019, that’s the very conversation the podcaster had with Gary Taubes & Stephan Guyenet on episode #1276. After listening to his guests intently, Rogan repeated their thoughts that may not be common knowledge even today: Would 2,000 calories from a healthy diet have a massively different effect on the body in comparison to the same amount of calories from junk and processed food? Yes, Taubes, a low-carbohydrate/high-fat diet advocate, stated, while Rogan agreed.

But that was 2019. Does the UFC color commentator have the same beliefs about the $400+ billion fast food industry, even in 2025? Well, it seems so because on episode #2315 of the JRE podcast, he invited World Central Kitchen founder, Chef Jose Andres. The guest pointed out how easy it was to accumulate calories with so many food options available today.

Basing his statements on this, Rogan said, “It’s not calories, it’s the type of calories, it’s processed food that you could keep on the shelf forever, because food’s not supposed to be able to sit on the shelf like that forever. And the kind of food that can is not healthy for you, that’s why it doesn’t rot. It doesn’t rot ‘cuz it’s not alive.” Chef Andres then pointed out another aspect about the popularity of junk and ultra-processed food that doesn’t get talked about much. It is cheap, and it is easily accessible.

“But eating too much of anything, I could argue with you that it’s a big conversation… It’s been obviously very easy [to] attack the fast food industry to the junk food industry, to call it whatever, on the pandemic and the obesity, to the soda industry… But at the same time, they are not the only ones part of the problem, either. Look at me, I’m overweight… I’m not overweight because [of] junk food. I’m not overweight because of fast food, I’m not overweight because of sodas. I’m overweight because I ate too much, because the food I eat is very good food. You can get fat on carrots and gazpacho, too,” Chef Andres said on episode #2315 of the JRE podcast.

“We have people that are poor right now, that used not to happen, and if you were poor, you were skinny and maybe you were hungry. Now we are in this situation that you have people who are poor, and it’s difficult to explain, and some seem that they be overweight because the food they are able to buy is very cheap, because it’s all this junk food. And that’s part of the problem.

“And they are not only overweight, but unhealthy because they’re bad calories, bad quality food, because they cannot afford anything else. And sometimes it’s not only about affording, it’s because they don’t have access to anything else… I say every American child deserves to be fed, and no American family should be poor and hungry ever again,” he pleaded.

Indeed, what Chef Andres is talking about is a well-documented and studied phenomenon. Lower-income families in America have tighter food budgets. And since ‘bad’ calories (such as those found in fast food) are cheaper than ‘good’ calories on a per-calorie basis, many poorer families have no choice but to choose junk food simply because of the cost differential. But that’s not where it ends.

By 2023, the US became one of the biggest importers of fruits and vegetables, though it is an exporter too. While the country’s production volume has been stable across years, imports rose by 129% for fruits and by 155% for vegetables in the past two decades. The imports, along with a complicated global supply chain for perishable foods, led to the higher cost.

Fast food and ultra-processed food consumption are also linked to chronic health issues like diabetes and high blood pressure, which is a huge disadvantage of eating this type of food. But Chef Andres feels that if the choice is between bad calories and fewer calories, he would much rather prefer the former simply because some families may not be able to afford enough calories otherwise. Speaking of controversial takes on health issues, Chef Andres wasn’t the only one who had hot takes on health issues.

Why does Joe Rogan think ADHD is a superpower?

“I subscribe to the idea that ADHD is a superpower, I really do, because I think the people that can’t focus on nonsense, generally speaking, they can focus on things they love. Really focused, they get really excited about certain things, but everything else they can’t be bothered with,” Rogan told Chef Jose Andres

Rogan is talking about one particular aspect of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) here, namely, hyper-focus. As the name suggests, hyper-focus leads to intense, almost unbreakable concentration on a particular stimulus or task, which leads to high-quality and highly productive results. But it is very much a double-edged sword.

Hyper-focusing on one task can lead to individuals with ADHD neglecting other important tasks like hygiene, eating, sleeping, and social obligations; Not to mention, it is also important what you are hyper-focused on. If, for instance, you hyper-focus on a particular aspect of academic work or a script you are writing for your work, that could be a net positive.

But if you’re hyper-focused on, say, YouTube or a video game, that could have adverse effects on your life. But Rogan is concentrating on the positives of the condition and proclaimed proudly to Chef Andres that “whatever ADHD is, I have it.”