Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman and this is Science Versus from Gimlet Media.

On today's show we're pitting facts against fads and we're exploring the powers of meditation.

This is so pretty. What is this?

That is, I think it's a parrot. So every once in a blue moon, you will spot a parrot in San Francisco.

I'm walking with Tim Ferris in this beautiful park in San Francisco. There's winding parts

and it's dotted with hikers and dogs on leashes.

Tim is a best-selling author who writes books that tell you how to exponentially increase your income

while working for only a few hours a week or how to get a buff body with barely any gym time.

Ultimately, Tim describes himself as a...

Professional dilatant human guinea pig self-experimentary. I've written a couple of books that sound like

impermarsial products like the four hour work week, four hour this and that.

Now as a self-experimenter, Tim is always trying to improve his life and his mind.

And this is something he talks about on his podcast, the Tim Ferris Show, where he interviews

successful people about what makes them successful.

I interview 250 of what I consider to be the world's top performers across every possible discipline

from physics to mathematics, chess, military, entertainment and one of the few common threads

is that they almost all have a mindfulness practice.

And one of the most popular is meditation. People like US Senator Cory Booker and even Arnold Schwarzenegger

told Tim how great meditation had been for them. Here's Arnie talking about it on Tim's show.

I don't feel overwhelmed anymore. Even the day I still benefit from that, I dig on one

challenge at the time. So Tim kept hearing again and again about how useful meditation had been

for some really successful people. And so he wanted to try it out.

...