Mike Israetel's PhD is a Joke

[Vali2003]

It’s illogical that it was a draft. The university had this uploaded for 12 years as his PhD, and Mike Israetel, or anybody else, didn’t notice it was just a really shitty draft? 

If it was a draft, he wouldn’t need an in-depth answer or rebuke. Just correct the mistake, upload the reviewed version as fast as possible — because the more time passes, the more suspicious — and you’ll be good.

The Guy from the video says he’s doing a full scholarship doctorate at Melbourne law school, so I think he’s not completely ignorant what a PhD should look like. 

I recommend you to watch the full video. The arguments you make about his claim collapsing, if you assume it was just a draft are wrong. He misinterprets literature, one equation he uses several times ( skill 1 + skill 2 + skill 3 = total skill, or something like that) is wrong, his methodical approach is completely flawed (just comparing the top 5 and bottom 5 performers) and unjustified and then on top of of that you have grave statistical mistakes. Things that you’d usually see at an instant. Plus you have the countless grammatical and formatting issues. Of course, you can say it’s all because it was a first draft. And maybe that turns out to be the truth. But it seems quite unlikely at this point.

One danger is of course that no one here has actually read the entire dissertation and therefore we have to rely that Solomon Nelson didn’t nitpick. But honestly, with this amount of mistakes, it’s impossible to call it nitpicking. Even if it’s a 100 pages document. 

 

[Vali2003]

@Leo Gura Yes, I’m pretty sure he just wanted a PhD as quickly as possible so he can later reap the benefits. 

It seems to be a broader issue with sports science, but in the near future some groundbreaking stuff will come out in regards to fascia research. So you shouldn’t close your mind off from sports science too much. However, most of that research will come / is coming from medicinal doctors anyways. 

[Leo Gura]

The formalism of science hides its shallowness.

[Carl-Richard]

Mike should make sure the real thesis is publically available (for those with access of course) through the same university library systems. If he doesn't, that's highly suspect. But we're still only a few days in and we'll probably see more on that soon (or it has already been addressed in the video I linked).

Edited Saturday at 09:35 PM by Carl-Richard

[freddyteisen]

58 minutes ago, Vali2003 said:

fascia research. So you shouldn’t close your mind off from sports science too much.

Yup, fascia is very interesting (how fascia can hold trauma, fascia release, functional movement etc). I agree you can't just close it off. Every field you partake in will have corruption, wether it's sportscience, medicine, law, economics, business etc., but that doesn't mean all of it is bad.

Edited Saturday at 09:48 PM by freddyteisen

[Socrates]

PhD is a marketing trick to appeal to orange idiots. Other than that, it is obsolete, especially if you care about knowledge.

[Xonas Pitfall]

Aww... isn't that my favorite Phd Pure 100% Natty, 100% Grit Dedication & Muscle Power Bodybuilder Sygma-Alpha MafiaBoss Apex Predator Wolf Tank Philosophical Modern Day Aristotel Definitely Not Homosexually Homoerotic Pun Genius Mastermind Prodigy Intellectual Sage Thinker Visionary Scholar Brilliant Savant Witty Humorist Wordsmith Observant Bald Jewish Man with Erectile Dysfunction? 

[Xonas Pitfall]

 

Edited Sunday at 01:24 AM by Xonas Pitfall

[Natasha Tori Maru]

43 minutes ago, Xonas Pitfall said:

Aww... isn't that my favorite Phd Pure 100% Natty, 100% Grit Dedication & Muscle Power Bodybuilder Sygma-Alpha MafiaBoss Apex Predator Wolf Tank Philosophical Modern Day Aristotel Definitely Not Homosexually Homoerotic Pun Genius Mastermind Prodigy Intellectual Sage Thinker Visionary Scholar Brilliant Savant Witty Humorist Wordsmith Observant Bald Jewish Man with Erectile Dysfunction? 

I have been inundated by the weight & volume of the nouns, adjectives & verbs used to describe the human flesh suit in question

A small smile grew wider the longer the passage was read !

 

[Leo Gura]

5 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

Mike should make sure the real thesis is publically available (

His real thesis is written in crayon.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

17 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

His real thesis is written in crayon.

Now I'm picturing the bastard eating crayons with one eye off to the side.

The arm maniacally scribbling his profound insights across the scrapbooks

[Carl-Richard]

10 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Even if it was just a draft, the substance of the research is shit. It doesn't matter how well it is written or how accurate the math is, what matters is that nothing new was discovered or said. It is 200 pages of pointlessness written just so you could call yourself a doctor.

You can't draft your way out of that problem.

They do actually claim it says new things, but yes, it's very "autistic" or concerned with minutia and going way and beyond reasonable doubt and using rigorous methods, but so is science. If somebody claims hitting yourself with a hammer can lead to tissue damage, it's one thing to say that and say "yes, that makes sense" and it's another thing to measure that damage (how much, how hard, etc.), define the different types of damage and standardizing them, control the use of different hammers and different forces, and of course doing controlled experiments, actually putting it to the test. Whether increased muscle actually leads to increased strength was actually a debate going on in sports science at the time, and Mike contributed to that debate with his PhD.

 

10 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

This shows the hollowness of sports science. They will write 200 pages of jargon just to tell you that eating donuts makes you fat. This is an aspect of the larger issue of the corruption of science and academia. Science and academia are used to bullshit. And scientists do not understand this problem deeply enough because they are in on the racket.

I'll stay with my earlier critiques of Mike Israetel and his ilk and say that the hard-hitting critiques of current sports science, and especially when trying to use it to claim "this is the optimal way to train", is not that it's substanceless bullshit, but that there is a severe lack of ecological validity in the research designs. Working out with one arm using one technique and the other arm using another technique, is absolutely a ridiculous basis for making claims for what is optimal training, because none of that is optimal. That's just one example. I could speak about it for days, faster and with more fervor than Mike talks about his totally non-ironic ironic homoerotic intrusive thoughts.

Edited Sunday at 07:28 AM by Carl-Richard

[Leo Gura]

The notion that one needs science to be an effective gym-rat is a joke.

Squat

Benchpress

Shoulder press

Deadlift

Rows

Curls

There's all the science you need to get swole.

And of course steroids.

Edited Sunday at 07:54 AM by Leo Gura

[Carl-Richard]

6 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

The notion that one needs science to be an effective gym-rat is a joke.

Squat

Benchpress

Shoulder press

Deadlift

Rows

Curls

There's all the science you need to get swole.

And of course steroids.

Not everybody wants to be just an effective gym rat. Some people want to be the best gym rat, the gym rat most aligned with "truth"  

Edited Sunday at 08:00 AM by Carl-Richard

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Carl-Richard Tell me more about this hammer and the hitting of people with it 

I'm an expert when it comes to abusing drywallers with tools on the site  - I prefer powertools myself 

I agree though - understanding the mechanisms behind the body enable better real world application. Sometimes one discovery unlocks a host of others due to the holistic nature of the human. As an example - women should train around their monthly cycles. Work with the natural ebbs and flows of energy. Understanding the hormone cycle enables me to train heavier during some parts of my cycle, knowing my recovery will be better. Thus I know I can go hard some weeks and recovery won't impact my functioning at work. Other weeks I need to roll the fuck back as I just won't be able to go near PRs and recover.

[Carl-Richard]

22 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

the natural ebbs and flows of energy.

🤔🧐🤔🧐🤔🧐 I used those words lately.

 

On 1.10.2025 at 8:40 AM, Carl-Richard said:

Human beings go through a long list of different ebbs and flows like this throughout a day, or week, or month, or year, and getting sensitive to those ebbs and flows and acting with them harmoniously is honestly the bulk of what meaning is about. But figuring out those ebbs and flows often requires something out of you, be it training your awareness up from the standard sleep-like state you've been conditioned into by modern society, or educating yourself about the principles of how the ebbs and flows work.

 

Now it's when you tell us you did not read that comment prior and only picked it up associatively from the collective mindspace 🙂🙂👍👍

Edited Sunday at 08:50 AM by Carl-Richard

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Carl-Richard What the FUCK

I wish I could tell you I read that post before you linked it....

iTz HapPEnInG AgAIn

[Carl-Richard]

17 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

@Carl-Richard What the FUCK

I wish I could tell you I read that post before you linked it....

iTz HapPEnInG AgAIn

Nanananana. Na.

😂

Edited Sunday at 09:09 AM by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

22 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Nanananana. Na.

@Xonas Pitfall

This is what that "does your mom know you're gay" dude calls an exponible statement by the way (unless it only applies to propositions 🤓).

Edited Sunday at 09:32 AM by Carl-Richard

[Socrates]

4 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

The notion that one needs science to be an effective gym-rat is a joke.

Squat

Benchpress

Shoulder press

Deadlift

Rows

Curls

There's all the science you need to get swole.

And of course steroids.

The fuck is this naive reductionism? You can use science to maximize your results in any domain. There is nothing magical about these exercises you listed. 

The mindset should be "let's explore" what actually works, not to keep our preconceived notions about what we think it does.

Where is the curiosity, where is the questioning....