DailyDirt: Sugar, Yes, Please...

The number of calories you can ingest as soda or juice can be surprisingly high, if you're not accustomed to accounting for your caloric intake. There's a reason why so many diet soft drinks exist -- and why a few low-cal beers are on the market. Drinking fewer calories just seems like an easier path to consuming fewer calories.

• Should you rely on artificial sweeteners instead of sugar to get your sweetness fix? Obviously, artificial sweeteners aren't "natural" (well, except for Stevia or tagatose), but that doesn't necessarily mean they're bad for your health. Added sugar in your diet correlates with some health problems, but so far, serious health issues aren't so strongly associated with artificial sweeteners. [url]
• Aspartame acquired a bad reputation for causing cancer in rats, but actual health problems for humans haven't been demonstrated. Unless you're one of the rare individuals with phenylketonuria, there's little scientific evidence that you should be concerned about consuming a reasonable amount of aspartame. But if you're worried about your gut bacteria, the scientific jury is still out on the long-term effects from altering a person's microbiome. [url]
• Coca-Cola is moving away from sugary drinks with lower calorie products that replace sugar with sweeteners like Stevia. Stevia-sweetened Coke hasn't caught on (yet?), but it's the more "natural" successor to Diet Coke. [url]

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