My guest on today's podcast - Gary Taubes - just wrote a groundbreaking, eye-opening exposé entitled "" that makes the convincing case that sugar is the tobacco of the new millennium: backed by powerful lobbies, entrenched in our lives, and making us very sick. Among Americans, diabetes is more prevalent today than ever; obesity is at epidemic proportions; nearly 10% of children are thought to have nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. And Gary believes sugar is at the root of these, and other, critical society-wide, health-related problems. In the book, he delves into Americans' history with sugar: its uses as a preservative, as an additive in cigarettes, the contemporary overuse of high-fructose corn syrup. He explains what research has shown about our addiction to sweets. He clarifies the arguments against sugar, corrects misconceptions about the relationship between sugar and weight loss; and provides the perspective necessary to make informed decisions about sugar as individuals and as a society. is cofounder and senior scientific advisor of the Nutrition Science Initiative (NuSI). He's an award-winning science and health journalist, the author of The Case Against Sugar, Why We Get Fat and Good Calories, Bad Calories, and a former staff writer for Discover and correspondent for the journal Science. His writing has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, and Esquire, and has been included in numerous Best of anthologies, including The Best of the Best American Science Writing (2010). He has received three Science in Society Journalism Awards from the National Association of Science Writers. He is also the recipient of a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigator Award in Health Policy Research. He lives in Oakland, California. During our discussion, you'll discover: -The difference between glucose and fructose, and how is that related to sucrose...[7:35] -Why the fructose we eat now is different than the fructose we find in nature...[14:20] -How German researchers discovered sugar to be just as as effective as "crack cocaine"...[21:10] -The fascinating marriage of tobacco and sugar, and why sugar is in cigarettes...[27:50] -How "metabolic imprinting" causes a baby's pancreatic cells to become dysfunctional...[33:35] -Why salt may not be the cause for hypertension, but sugar may...[44:00] -The relationship between sugar, gout and uric acid, and why gout and uric acid may not just be protein related...[47:10 & 57:00] -Why different people have different blood sugar responses to sugar...[49:20] -What Gary thinks of the fact that he's been called out on the fact that the NuSci metabolic ward research found no insulin-obesity link, and whether it's calories, not macronutrients, that are most important...[65:00] -And much more! Resources from this episode: - Show Sponsors: -Wild Mountain Paleo - Visit and use code BenPili10 for 10% off your order. -Purathrive - Go to to automatically get 15% off on Curcumin Gold or Radiant C (a liposomal vitamin C that actually tastes GOOD), or anything else that tickles your fancy. -Oak - Meditation & Breathing -  go to now to download the app, completely FREE. -ZipRecruiter - Post jobs on ZipRecruiter for FREE by visiting . Do you have questions, thoughts or feedback for Gary or me? Leave your comments at and one of us will reply!