Hacker News Reader

Comment by 1970-01-01 | Hacker News Reader

1970-01-01

>one of the most exhaustively studied substances in the human food supply

About a year ago, this single fact changed my mind about it being 'very bad' for you. If given a choice between a sugar drink (cola) and an aspartame flavored drink ('zero' cola), I will take the aspartame.

View on HN

> If given a choice between a sugar drink (cola) and an aspartame flavored drink ('zero' cola), I will take the aspartame.

I don't understand why this should even be choice. Why not drink water, and know that it's the best possible option?

Right? I was reading the article and did a double take when he described the choices being either aspartame, or sugar.

I think it's an American thing though. When I've been over there, everything was so sickeningly sweet.

I'm surprised you did a double take, considering the article is about aspartame, a replacement for sugar.

What would the other choices be when you're talking about substitutes? Why would you expect the inclusion of items that are not substitutes?

Because sometimes people arent replacing sugar water with aspartame water, they are replacing water water with aspartame water.

If it makes you feel better plenty of Americans feel the same way. We just don't stock the stores and choose the menus :(

Often sodas (non sugary or not) complement foods better than water. For example I really dislike just drinking water when eating a pizza. If I'm thirsty I'd obviously drink water, cheaper, healthier and gets the job done the same way.

Perhaps, but it's also an acquired taste, and you can train yourself to enjoy foods with water, speaking from personal experience. Yogurt drinks go well with many foods as well, especially spice ones.

for a good pizza unfortunately usually the best thing is a good beer, but maybe try mineral water with gas?

Pizza and caffeine free Diet Pepsi hits a special spot for me.

Once, I was given the choice between an apple and an orange, and chose a mango. This is evidence of my exceptional intellect and skill at thinking out of the box.

This isn’t a debate about how to hydrate.

It’s a debate about drinking sugar or artificial sweeteners when you want to enjoy a drink. Why is that fact lost in this discussion?

Because some people love different drinks? Water is good too but people enjoy drinking different things. I actually don't understand how so many people in this thread are completely blind to this and are like "Why don't you just enjoy the world like I do?"

Water is flavorless.

I’ve never understood this reasoning, why is this a downside? You need water to live. Air has no scent and yet no one insists on only consuming air with scented candles.

Besides, if you really need a flavour, squirt a little citrus juice or something in there, your tastebuds don’t need to be bombarded 24/7.

Yes and we can all sit and eat flavourless rice cakes too! No one ever needs to eat anything apart from totally bland and flavourless substances! /s

People eat for pleasure, and people drink for pleasure too. People like things to taste nice sometimes, get off their case.

>squirt a little citrus juice or something in there

When I'm offered a drink, it's a very simple, go/no-go life decision. I don't prepare and carry fruit juices around in my pockets.

Speaking as an American ex-Diet Coke addict who now mostly drinks water, I've found the off-the-shelf sweet drinks I do occasionally consume — fruit juices and ginger ale, mostly — taste better mixed roughly 4:1 with water, because less sweet.

When offered a drink, aside from the occasional (non-sweet) alcoholic beverage, I typically choose (flavorless) water.

"I'll take sparkling water and a lime wedge, thank you"

But that is basically adding liquid fructose, sugar.

The dose is what makes the difference here.

> Air has no scent and yet no one insists on only consuming air with scented candles.

Well that's not true at all, given that millions of households use continuous plug-in air fresheners all day, every day. Multiple industries exist solely around scenting the air. Your analogy just doesn't hold up to reality.

Like many of the other commenters, I am compelled to let you know that your preference is immoral because it doesn't align with my views. You should stop doing a harmless thing that suits your taste.

Moreover, your thoughts are so toxic that we've shadowbanned you from the community. Your opinions are not welcome here. If you attempt to create a new account, you'll be banned again and we'll publicly shame you and report you to your employer. You don't deserve health care. Get off the internet and stop breathing.

(This is why we need p2p communication protocols over platforms and federation. The loud, unreasonable moderators and censors are in the minority. Most people can agree to disagree and appreciate diversity of thought.)

Are we still talking about not liking the taste of water, or are you more talking about shit like thinking all gay people are child groomers?

Carborated mineral water isn't flavorless and way better than sugary drinks.

I wouldn’t say this to an Italian within fighting distance, heh…

Your drink does not need to be entertainment.

Sure, neither does your food. But you’re unlikely to convince anyone by moralizing about it, and you’ll probably just cause them to tune you out entirely. I say this as someone who drinks mostly plain water.

I don't see any moralizing in what you're replying to. I see them challenging an assumption that is an extremely common one in American culture.

> American culture

People online seem to have such a fascination with finding every possible thing wrong with American culture. Then they generalize across 330 million people, and completely ignore that the rest of the world has equally incomprehensible or destructive habits.

I guess we should be honored? Nobody bothers criticizing Europeans because Europe is largely irrelevant.

Well that's an awful lot to take from my comment. Is this some sort of "hit dogs holler" thing?

I'm American. I live in America. But I'm posting in a global forum, and I'm addressing something that's very specifically American. I wasn't even necessarily criticizing. Different places have different tastes. But the top soda brands are, Red Bull aside, all American in origin: https://www.zippia.com/advice/largest-soda-brands/

Tell that to drinkers of wine, beer, juice, and tea.

Add a little fruit juice.

But fruit juice has loads of sugar.

It's typically about ten percent sugars by weight. Adding a little fruit juice to your water results in one tenth of a little sugar.

Or, you know, just drink the aspartame one and be done with it.

Why do you need flavor in your beverage when foods have so much of it?

I do not 'need' the additional flavor. It is simply a life enhancement.

You do not need anything to enhance your life. You will drink your soylent and water, and be happy about it.

Might as well be high on cocaine every waking hour

Water doesn't have caffeine. I know many people who take their caffeine in the form of diet sodas instead of tea or coffee.

I don't like the taste of water unless I'm super thirsty and I love the taste of coke zero/diet dr. pepper. It really is as simple as that and aspartame/ace k have been shown to be safe in the doses put into diet sodas.

One thing I didn't know prior to reading the article is that one of the major suppliers of aspartame is the same company that first commercialized MSG -- another compound that has been unfairly maligned and exhaustively studied as a result.

Despite decades of research and hundreds upon hundreds of studies, there's never been a definitive link shown between MSG and its claimed negative effects. In fact, I've seen studies where subjects responded to placebo at a higher rate than they did actual MSG.

Yet it's still very common to run into people that are absolutely convinced they have a sensitivity to MSG despite the fact that all evidence suggests that no such sensitivity actually exists.

    Yet it's still very common to run into people that 
    are absolutely convinced they have a sensitivity to 
    MSG despite the fact that all evidence suggests that 
    no such sensitivity actually exists.

Here's a pattern I've seen in at least two people here in America. I suspect it's probably pretty widespread.

1. Subject is a person who does not eat Asian/Asian-American food very often

2. Subject eats some Asian/Asian-American food, full of many ingredients they don't typically consume

3. Food does not agree with subject in some way or another

4. Subject then decides it "must be the MSG" when of course it might be just be high sodium content that is common in takeout/delivery food, or any of the other ingredients they don't normally consume, or perhaps they just got some spoiled food or something

Subject then downs an entire bag of Doritos without complaint

Also every single one of those people enjoys Doritos or Cheetos or Cheez-It’s which are all packed full to the brim with MSG.

What is most upsetting is that I have trouble biochemically believing there could be anything at all on which to act. MSG = mono sodium glutamate meaning one sodium ion (thing in table salt) + gluatamic acid (1 of the 20 standard amino acids). Every protein in your body, plants, and animals will be ~5% glutamic acid. The instant MSG touches your tongue, it will immediately dissociate into sodium + glutamic acid and would be indistinguishable from another protein source.

Yep, it's also naturally occurring in all sorts of Asian food (due to soy or something) if I understood what I read correctly. That's why "no msg" Asian food tastes so awful.

I think neither are particularly dangerous, but habitually drinking soda is itself just terrible for your teeth.

I wouldn't drink either, because even the ones with sugar are contaminated with aspartame.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com