I think you’re right. But... Joe Rogan often claims he’s not a genius, and not an expert in many topics. I also feel his fan community strongly understands this. There are a lot of YouTube videos making fun of his mannerisms and when he might be too high on an interview.
To me this is as good as it gets for a talk show that has a wide ranging set of topics like the JRE. Joe Rogan isn’t an expert and doesn’t pretend to be unbiased on all issues. His community, I think, understands his limitations. He just runs a good conversation, and that’s all I want to hear.
Yes, he does a great job playing the curious and interested, but mostly uninformed everyman. This has the "explain it like I'm 5" effect on his guests, which forces them to be relatable instead of using jargon. It's a lot more valuable for most listeners than two people trying to one-up each other in how intellectual and sophisticated they can sound.
I'm a frequent listener and the only subject I assume Rogan is an authority on is martial arts and nutrition. I ignore much of what else he says, but I respect his knowledge on those two topics.
Other listeners I've spoken to feel the same way. And I reckon Rogan knows that too
He is very biased toward the carnivore/keto kind of diet and dismisses any kind of plant-based diets with "bro science". I would never listen to his nutrition advice, it's just incredibly biased and factually incorrect.
Most of our current long-term (>1 year long) studies about diets deal with the problem of "subjects not sticking to the diet" by just saying that X% of participants stopped the diet and then proceeding to analyze the health benefits for the Y% that stuck to it.
That's a fair thing to do, but what's not supported from those results is the conclusion that such a diet would have worked very well for the X% had they stuck to it.
To me this is as good as it gets for a talk show that has a wide ranging set of topics like the JRE. Joe Rogan isn’t an expert and doesn’t pretend to be unbiased on all issues. His community, I think, understands his limitations. He just runs a good conversation, and that’s all I want to hear.