Really? Fuck. Well, guess that leaves Jeff Nippard and LeanBeefPatty as still solid, hopefully. Been away from the lifting world but that sucks about Mike.

For some reason, I always thought his main contribution from his PhD was the volume thresholds for maintenance and adaptation.

In any case, are we judging his value as a researcher or as a YouTuber? If it's the former, I'd rather look at his publishing history rather than a thesis. Soloman mentioned that the school he graduated from wasn't a particularly high ranking school, and that's evidenced by how they were able to let this pass. Knowing how your school works, why would you put any effort at all into what is essentially just a formality for graduation? Where I went for grad school, the examiners will read your work properly, but most people still only put in the minimal effort for it. Our efforts mostly go into papers that actually get read. Your thesis is never expected to see the light of day again after graduation.

If we're judging him for his value as a YouTuber, then we should be judging his YouTube content. As far as that goes, he's pretty much just preaching the same thing as every other fitness YouTuber. It's just packaged differently. The one thing he does that stands out from others is explaining how science and the scientific method works when putting exercise science papers into context. I can understand his credentials being relevant here if you're a non-expert, but as a scientist myself, I can vouch for the soundness of his explanations.

Jeff's response was definitely disappointing though. Insulting Soloman does not align with the wholesome character of him that was painted in my head.