Mom : Nak try kopi tanpa gula?
Would you like to try this sugarless coffee?
Me : Kopi tanpa gula? Tak rasa pape lah eh?
White coffee without sugar? Won't it be tasteless?
Mom : Boleh guna sweetener ni. Diperbuat daripada extract daun.
You can add this sweetener. It's made of leaves extracts.
(Skeptically pick up the sweetener)
Me : Betul ke ni mak?
Are you sure it's made of leaves extract?
Mom : Betul, betul, dia tulis tu kan.
I'm serious, it's written there.
I read the ingredient where a bunch of chemical stuffs written.
Me : Ada gambar daun je mak. Takkan gambar daun pun mak cakap extract daun??
There's only a picture of leaves mom. You can't be saying that because of the picture?
Mom didn't believe me and went to read herself. She sat down, put her glasses on and starting to pronounce the chemical ingredients one by one.
Mom : Semua ni bukan extract daun ke?
All these are not leaves extract?
Me : No mom, please don't argue with a chemist.
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The fact is, it could damn well be a leaves extract except that a sweetener is a sweetener. It bounds to contain additional chemically modified sugar to make it sweeter so that you don't have to take so much of sugar. In one way it's good to take it occasionally to cut down your sugar intake but chemistry wise, in my humble opinion, it's not any better than the real sugar.
Back in university, a lecturer told us a story bout his colleague who studied on these artificial sweetener and the effect it has on mice. I can't exactly recall the details of his story but it goes something like this, the colleague was so keen on taking the sweetener deeply believing that the sweetener is a good sugar substitute. However after a period of time, he found some I don't know mutation or tumor on the mice, I really can't remember what it was but something happened to the mice that in the end he never wanted to eat the artificial sweetener ever again.
Now, now, I don't have the published data because god knows how scientists need published paper to prove their findings but what I assure you is that too much of something is never good.
Conclusion? Do things in moderation ok and not everything natural is good. Verify your facts from reliable source and despite everything written on the internet nowdays, even the most decent looking website could mislead you.
P/s : If you happen to google on soursop for cancer, you may found that it's ten thousand times better than chemo but truth is, I digged up deeper on the article and the published paper where it talked about the seed not the fruit and it was an in vitro experiment which when comes to in vivo, it might behave differently. When soursop is taken excessively it could lead to excessive bleeding, and even some other diseases. All these are based on my literature research for my work. Sorry for not putting the links, they're stored in my other disk.
