I looked at the science behind four of these popular sweeteners to determine which ones you can safely incorporate into your diet and which ones need to go the way of those nasty artificial sweeteners.

Sweeteners condition our taste buds to want more sweet. Consuming excessive amounts of sugar triggers your brain and body to want sugar most of the time. If your blood sugar dips down, your body gets a signal to eat more sugar. It's almost as if your system has been hijacked.

A group of food companies has filed a lawsuit against the Sugar Association, a trade group representing the sugar industry, for making false claims in advertising that allegedly caused loss of profit and other damages.

Even if we were to isolate sugar as public health enemy number one, its regulation would draw us into challenging subtleties.

Ditching that regular soda and switching to a diet version may not be the perfect fix-it healthy solution. Research shows that both versions may lead to disease.

Concerned scientists and researchers fought and were successful in keeping aspartame out of the food supply for over 10 years, and many of those still alive continue to speak out against it today.

Many clients I see in my practice have come to believe that artificial sweeteners are a healthier way to satisfy their cravings for sweet. Unfortunately, they're not.

It's hard to believe such a hazardous chemical would be allowed into the food supply, but it was, and it has been wreaking silent havoc with people's health for the past 30 years.

As obesity continues to top news stories and consumers become more conscious about the source of our food, these two ideas seem to be a marketing dream scenario: a miracle ingredient!

In 1975, a FDA Task Force conducted a comprehensive review of the scientific literature on the toxicity of aspartame, revealing suppressed evidence on the toxic and carcinogenic effects of aspartame.