Joe Rogan Experience #2139 - Akaash Singh

Joe Rogan and comedian Akaash Singh open marveling at Phish's Sphere residency in Vegas before drifting into a wide-ranging conversation. They discuss handling fame and criticism, jealousy in comedy, the genetics of attraction, and the immigrant experience including Akaash's father's hard transition from India to Texas. The talk turns dark on New York crime, illegal immigration, defunding the police, and racial profiling. They get into health and the carnivore diet, government bureaucracy and the 'deep state,' Tucker Carlson's reframing of Watergate, the Will Smith Oscars slap, and the explosive rise of AI image and video generation. It closes on the craft of comedy, listening as a skill, and Rogan's Austin comedy club.

• Dana White told Rogan the UFC has already spent $9 million preparing for its September Sphere event.
  00:02:38
• Rogan recounts knocking a fighter unconscious with a wheel kick at 19; the kid never woke up on his own and Rogan never learned what happened to him.
  00:35:18
• Rogan reveals he quit fighting partly because of recurring post-sparring headaches and fear of brain damage.
  00:37:54
• Akaash explains his father was a PCS government officer set to be a millionaire in India before an arranged marriage and sudden move to America derailed his life.
  00:53:35
• Rogan reflects on CNN allegedly altering footage to make him look yellow during his ivermectin/COVID controversy.
  01:28:31
• Tucker Carlson (via Rogan) reframes Watergate as a deep-state coup involving CIA employees and a naval intelligence officer turned reporter.
  01:36:50
• Rogan describes bringing Tucker Carlson and Post Malone on stage at Kill Tony with no advance warning.
  02:17:57

• Roughly 70 billion chickens are killed worldwide every year for food.
  00:48:52
• India has about 1.4 billion people on roughly a quarter the land area of the United States.
  00:57:14
• A man kept a McDonald's hamburger from 1995 that still looks fresh decades later due to preservatives.
  01:05:06
• Akaash used to walk 45 minutes home through Manhattan at 1 a.m. in 2008 when New York felt extremely safe.
  01:31:39
• Rogan notes Bush won Florida by roughly 500 votes (the 533-vote hanging-chad election) which arguably reshaped decades of history.
  01:49:21
• Depleted uranium rounds self-ignite at high temperatures and become sharper as they penetrate armor.
  01:53:30
• A study attributed Gulf War syndrome more to nerve agent sarin exposure than to depleted uranium.
  01:55:40
• AI voice cloning reportedly needs only about 30 seconds of someone talking to mimic them.
  02:05:33
• Larry King famously did no prep for interviews and at one point didn't know who Jerry Seinfeld was at the height of his fame.
  02:23:35