This is a story of mistakes, propaganda, and ignorance. Bear with us and do not hate society by the end of this, because there’s no way of telling who acted in ignorance and who with evil intentions.
You are 80% cow! Not convinced? How about 98.8% chimpanzee? Ok, now you know where we are going. Studies show that humans share a lot of genes across the animal kingdom. And among ourselves? Well, you have 99.9% genes in common with any other human, including the ones you dearly love or hate.
What matters for this mission is the knowledge that even 0.01% of genes can make a lot of difference. Add up the differences in our environment, age, work, and lifestyle to this and it seems logical why products can’t be “one size fits all.” But the world still sells such things and we fall for them, especially if everyone around us promotes them, and one such thing is “Diet!”
While the word diet simply means the kinds of food that a person consumes, in day-to-day parlance, it stands for a strict plan followed to achieve an ideal physique, mostly with a weight loss. There are thousands of diets today, probably you have tried a few yourself and seen different results: some work, some don’t, but overall, nothing lasts forever.
Our bodies are complex. What works for your neighbor might not work for you. While many diets can help reduce 5% - 10% weight in the first few weeks, studies show that most people regain their original weight after 5 years, and around 40% end up weighing more than the original weight (Mann et al., 2007; Tomiyama et al., 2013). You may know some such people as well.
But one can argue that dieting is a life-long commitment. We agree, but if your diet feels like a punishment, maybe the culprit is not your diet, but your relationship with food.
Good Old Evolution
As we progress on this adventure, we will discover more aspects of a healthy diet, but for now let us focus on arguably the biggest culprit, refined sugar, or simply “sugar.”
While society is well-acquainted with ideas like “sugar rush” and why we should not feed sweet things to newborns, sugar is present in almost 80% of the food items we come across. What is the harm? Quick lesson time: Evolution developed our brains in a way that whenever we are offered a new food, “exotic” by definition, our brain’s reward system releases dopamine, which explains the temptation upon seeing something you have never tried before, even if it is broccoli for that matter. Why? Most probably because a balanced diet is the best way to ensure survival. But once we consume these previously “exotic” foods, chances are we will not get the same reward response the next time, maybe even feel repulsed by them if they tasted bad, unless it was sweet!
Sweet things work differently. In nature, mostly sweet things tend to be non-poisonous, and are always a great source of energy. This could partially explain why most of the times people choose sweet things over others when offered a choice. No matter how many times you consume sugar, your brain will always activate the reward system, the same feeling of accomplishment when you complete a big project or win a competition.
What else activates the reward system? Drugs. We get addicted to drugs because they make us feel good every time and this makes us want them even more.
The Dose Makes the Poison
In the 16th century, Paracelsus, a Swiss physician, regarded as the “Father of Toxicology,” said, “The dose makes the poison.” This statement is even more relevant today than before.
Have you heard of coca? Farmers in the Andes have chewed coca leaves for centuries to get energy. But coca is no ordinary plant. It is the source of the infamous drug cocaine. But none of the Andes farmers show the side-effects that cocaine is known for.
As Paracelsus said, the problem lies in the dose when you compare a coca leaf to its refined extract cocaine. A coca leaf contains around 0.8% cocaine. When you chew on coca leaf, your body gets an energy hit without any side effects since the cocaine is diluted. But if you take cocaine powder directly, you are giving your body a shock 100 times more potent than how it is found in nature. Similarly, cane sugar is usually 10 times more concentrated than its natural source sugarcane.
Now consider this: Sugar is 8 times more addictive than cocaine. Can’t believe? A study offered a choice between sweetened water and cocaine solution 8 times a day to a group of mice. Almost every time, the mice went for the sweet drink. It gets even more interesting because another study took a group of mice already addicted to cocaine and offered them a choice between a sweet solution and cocaine solution, and even these mice preferred the sweet option!
Evil or Ignorant?
Ok, sugar is bad, but how did it enter the common diet?
Throughout history, humans have done a lot of bad things, but it seems that a lot of it was just out of ignorance rather than intentional evil. From painkillers for Civil War soldiers causing morphine addiction to good old Coca-Cola having traces of cocaine in the past (hahaha, given the name Coca-Cola, they were surely not hiding anything), the human timeline tells a story of trial and error.
When the ill effects of fat came to common knowledge, in the mid-20th century, the food industry was forced to drop this secret tasty ingredient. So the search for the next tasty replacement started, and soon ended in sugar! As time passed, companies learned that sugar was far better to increase the sales of products and it could be added to almost anything, unlike fat.
Since everyone wants more sales, sugar soon ended up being in almost everything, from your ketchup to bread, not to mention all the sweet drinks in the market. This boosted sugar intake so much that today an average American consumes 82g of sugar per day! That is equivalent to eating around 1 kg sugarcane!
Remember, “The dose makes the poison.” While sugar is a good source of energy, it is its daily dose that is causing numerous health problems in today’s world, from obesity to diabetes.
Enough of what the industry has done. What can you do about it? In true Kosmik spirit, stick to these two ideas:
The change starts with you: The blame game has no end. Be the change you want to see
Balance is the key: Cutting sugar to zero is not only hard but also unnecessary. Just make sure you give your best to cut sugar to a minimum level