Seems sensible.

I have used artificial sweeteners to replace sugar. I hope they don't kill
me.

(I can't stand the "green" taste of stevia. I do avoid aspartame, after
watching a documentary on it.)

Igor reported success at rejecting all sweeteners.

I use saccharine, cyclamates, and sucralose.

Cubit
320/152/160


"Jim" wrote in message
...
[ Recent news article on rats preferring sugar water to cocaine is
substantated in this article available in full at the link below with the
abstract as follows. ]

Full Article
http://www.plosone.org/article/info:...l.pone.0000698



Intense Sweetness Surpasses Cocaine Reward

Magalie Lenoir#, Fuschia Serre#, Lauriane Cantin, Serge H. Ahmed*

University Bordeaux 2, Université Bordeaux 1, CNRS, UMR 5227, Bordeaux,
France

*Abstract*

Background

Refined sugars (e.g., sucrose, fructose) were absent in the diet of most
people until very recently in human history. Today overconsumption of
diets rich in sugars contributes together with other factors to drive the
current obesity epidemic. Overconsumption of sugar-dense foods or
beverages is initially motivated by the pleasure of sweet taste and is
often compared to drug addiction. Though there are many biological
commonalities between sweetened diets and drugs of abuse, the addictive
potential of the former relative to the latter is currently unknown.
Methodology/Principal findings

Here we report that when rats were allowed to choose mutually-exclusively
between water sweetened with saccharin–an intense calorie-free
sweetener–and intravenous cocaine–a highly addictive and harmful
substance–the large majority of animals (94%) preferred the sweet taste of
saccharin. The preference for saccharin was not attributable to its
unnatural ability to induce sweetness without calories because the same
preference was also observed with sucrose, a natural sugar. Finally, the
preference for saccharin was not surmountable by increasing doses of
cocaine and was observed despite either cocaine intoxication,
sensitization or intake escalation–the latter being a hallmark of drug
addiction.
Conclusions

Our findings clearly demonstrate that intense sweetness can surpass
cocaine reward, even in drug-sensitized and -addicted individuals. We
speculate that the addictive potential of intense sweetness results from
an inborn hypersensitivity to sweet tastants. In most mammals, including
rats and humans, sweet receptors evolved in ancestral environments poor in
sugars and are thus not adapted to high concentrations of sweet tastants.
The supranormal stimulation of these receptors by sugar-rich diets, such
as those now widely available in modern societies, would generate a
supranormal reward signal in the brain, with the potential to override
self-control mechanisms and thus to lead to addiction.

Citation: Lenoir M, Serre F, Cantin L, Ahmed SH (2007) Intense Sweetness
Surpasses Cocaine Reward. PLoS ONE 2(8): e698.
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0000698

Academic Editor: Bernhard Baune, James Cook University, Australia

Received: April 24, 2007; Accepted: July 4, 2007; Published: August 1,
2007

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:...l.pone.0000698