121–130 of 131 posts
It's good to see that Splenda isn't the potential toxic substance we began to wonder it was, but I agree that it tastes icky. That said, I wonder why Stevia isn't considered to sweeten drinks? It's very sweet, it's natural like sugar (meaning it's not synthetic or lab-grown), it also has zero calories, and it doesn't taste icky!
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> While I hate the idea of artificial sweeteners Don't take this as a personal attack on your opinion, but I just don't understand this. The distinction that we make between artificial chemicals and natural chemicals seems to be whether it was invented by humans or invented by evolution. That's a fine distinction to make, but why are human invented chemicals seen as the _worse_ of the two? When evolution invents a ch…
I'm on the fence on this one. Here's the logic of the anti-artificial crowd, as best I can put it... Humans have evolved alongside natural systems. And if humans have been eating something for a very long time, it's probably alright to eat. If a new sugar-like substance came into existence, it would probably come into existence as incremental changes to an existing system. Let's say that existing system was a staple…
Asbestos isn't manmade, its a naturally occurring set of minerals [1]. It was obviously put into various man-made objects, but the fiber itself is naturally occurring.
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>you eat nearly a pound of sugar per month? You don't?
Not raw sugar added to food, which is sort of implied in the ggp comment. It's at least not clear if they mean a 5 pound bag of sweetener or 5 pounds net.
A lot of people here say I should have just cut sugar and dealt with it. I missed it way too much. Before the first week of my low/no sugar diet was over, I was about to throw in the towel. With sucralose, I've made it 6 months now.
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> we have decades of studies proving what natural food does to the bodies You are making the false assumption "natural" foods are a correlated group as far as health goes. This is empirically false (ignoring the fact that natural has no scientific definition to begin with). Studying sucrose won't inform you of the dangers of cyanide though both are "natural".
To stay on topic, I'm not talking about anything other than stevia coming from leaves of Stevia rebaudiana whereas sugar comes from sugarcane. The process by which these two plants grow is natural and not synthetic. I'm not getting into the pointless debate about food being "natural", which I think is complete marketing hype.
The exception is if we can prove the two operate under the same fundamental mechanisms within the body. But there's nothing different about natural growing plants and man made substances under this sort of research. A molecule is a molecule.
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I think it comes down to trust. We're part of nature, created by it and in it. The naturally created chemicals we deal with have been around for longer than we have. We have generations of people who have tested them for both short-term and long-term effects. When things previously thought safe start to harm us, it's usually because of changes in processing, like adding sugar to everything. Human-created chemicals ar…
I can certainly see that, especially the corrupt companies side of things. But the argument doesn't make sense for anyone over 30 years old. Pre-industrial humans had a lifespan of about 30-50 years (30 years in-city, 50 years outside of city for most all of human history). Those are the humans who vetted all these natural chemicals; people who died at 30. If you're over 30, you're in unknown territory when it comes…
Meaning that you either died before you got to 5 years old, or you easily got* to the ripe age of 55. Average 30, but very different lifespans.
Also, many biological features are stable until 55, for example male strength with an adequate training.
It is after 55 that everything starts to fail. What's unknown territory is living more than 70.
* disregarding external factors like wars.
It's good to see that Splenda isn't the potential toxic substance we began to wonder it was, but I agree that it tastes icky. That said, I wonder why Stevia isn't considered to sweeten drinks? It's very sweet, it's natural like sugar (meaning it's not synthetic or lab-grown), it also has zero calories, and it doesn't taste icky!
> but I agree that it tastes icky. You should consider getting some liquid sucralose. I agree that splenda is yucky, but that's largely because of the fillers that make the volume measurement manageable. Pure liquid sucralose, which is nothing but sucralose and water, tastes exactly like sugar to me. Seriously, put both in some lemonade and I'd never be able to tell the difference.
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opium (for heroine) and coca (used for cocaine) are also natural. Being natural != being healthy.
But opium and cocaine have strong medicinal qualities.
www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/11/481641640/more-than-ever-americans-are-dying-by-accident
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But opium and cocaine have strong medicinal qualities.
Sure is inconvenient when facts disagree: www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/11/481641640/more-than-ever-americans-are-dying-by-accident
I'm kind of baffled at this comment.
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> While I hate the idea of artificial sweeteners Don't take this as a personal attack on your opinion, but I just don't understand this. The distinction that we make between artificial chemicals and natural chemicals seems to be whether it was invented by humans or invented by evolution. That's a fine distinction to make, but why are human invented chemicals seen as the _worse_ of the two? When evolution invents a ch…
My take? Zero-calorie sweeteners have no practical reason to exist. It is a marketer's pursuit to make us consume food in ever vaster quantities while being guilt free. What we should be doing is reducing our sugar intake given that most of us are no longer living on the edge of caloric survival. But that's hard, and not doing it comes with guilt and health issues. So instead we create a chemical that provides all th…
Life is short, why are you heaping guilt about enjoying something on a pleasure like eating?
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Because you're wrong. Stevia tastes nasty, like some kind of nasty unsweetened licorice or something. And they do use it to sweeten drinks. Go to any higher-end grocery store and you'll find weird-brand drinks with it, for weirdos like you who apparently can't taste the ick. What does cilantro taste like to you? To some people, it tastes like soap, to others it doesn't. There's a gene which controls this.
I wonder if the same can be said about sugar, where some people taste it as nice and others think it's too sweet or gross. There are various mixes and types of stevia out there. You should find the varieties.
I wonder how much of this is how much people are used to: if you keep drinking diet soda for years and years and "acquire" a taste for it, maybe then real sugar will taste weird to you.