This is know scientifically for ~10 years now (in a sense that there are some studies, and the biochemistry of mechanisms is know, but the statistical power of the studies might be low... can''t remember, left the biomedical field years ago), and anecdotally since like for ever (google "making fois gras").
Also, for cats and dogs, other sugar (xylitol if I member well) can destroy their livers pretty fast. Fortunately, we come from sugar-happy monkeys (that used to eat lots of rottenfruit), so we can safely enjoy our booze in moderation :)
And for extra self-destructive power, mix fructose and fats: your liver will be too overloaded processing the fructose (that btw, also gets transformed to extra fat and collesterol if its other metabolizing pathways get saturated) to be able to handle the fats correctly, so "bad collesterol" will accumulate in you blood, and then clog your arteries (yeah, it needs some extra help from inflamation).
But, oh, wait, there's a name for that: donuts! ...or virtually every other fatty sweet stuff. Oh, and for extra-extra-damage the fats should be fried (for reason I don't have time to detail). And there's a name for that too: KFC + dessert!
Now go enjoy your deserts! Or the fois gras you had before it ;)
Wtf does that even mean?! You mainly eat to get your calories... the calories are your main intended benefit, that's mainly why you eat, to get your fuel to burn. It's like the stupid phrase "empty calories". Also, the calories that you need to burn, will inevitably deal damage to your body in the process of being burn (free radicals -> aging, cancer etc.) and that's unavoidable.
But you can try to find the least damaging combination of source of calories (like at least don't mix high-fat with high-sugar in the same meal), and yeah, also so get your vitamins micronutrients, fibers etc. that you also need besides those calories.
And I agree with you too :) ...Lustig's paranoia is way over the top, especially when he gets to comparing fructose with alcohol (we're not cats and dogs - 'carnivores', we're 'rotten-and-occasionally-toxic-fruit eating monkeys', we can take our liquor and drugs as long as we don't overdo it :P), or calling it "toxic" or "poison".
When I say "calorie-heavy with no real benefit", I mean that you get glucose and fructose and that's it. No vitamins, no minerals, no fiber, just pure straight carbs. In other words just calories that your body can use or store, and unless you've been doing strenuous activity within a short time frame, those calories will be stored as fat.
The less confusing distinction would be between "slow (absorbed) calories" and "fast (absorbed) calories". That's what "glycemic index" and all that is all about. Most fibers are especially about this: they slow the absorbtion of sugars and other stuff, so they don't cause a spike in blood sugar concentration.
You can even have basically pure carbs that are absorbed slowly and have a good glycemic profile (they are glucose polymers that take longer to break up into the glucose monomers they are made of). One of these is the modified starch that you can also get "naturally" by reheating some types of pasta, others are pretty weird chemical inventions that are not proven safe yet I think...
You could eat just "pure slow carbs" and throw in some vitamin pills, essential fats, essential amino acids and antioxidants (they would all amount to like a small fist of pills a day I think) and be quite healthy I guess. Not sure why would anyone want to leave such a tasteless life though :)
EDIT+: actually, scratch that, your liver might actually fail long term if you don't pass something more akin to "real food" through your gut at least occasionally, for probably complex reasons that amount to "the liver is a damn complex chemical plant that is expected to actually run continuously on all pathways, not to be left abandoned" ...I'm really looking forward for 10+ years results for the people living on that soylent thing only btw.
"because sugar is calorie-heavy". That's it? What about all the studies that shows high consumption of sugar leads to diabetes, heart disease, mental health etc.?
Who knows what is true any more? May be big sugar companies are fighting back using fake studies and blogs to lessen the blame like they did with fat before.
Edit: I forgot to mention 2 real examples:
1. My father is not fat. We don't eat any junk foods, everything is cooked at home. He goes to office by cycle, it's long commute. But eats too much sweets and sugar, kind of addicted. He got diabetes, glucose reading 290 without food.
2. I started eating lots of sweets/sugar after I stayed at my parent's home for four months. When I sleep on my stomach, I started to feel my heart beat. It was not like this before. It was a bit scary. Then I read all those articles about sugar, and I figured that might be the reason. I stopped eating sugar completely. I no longer feel heart beat while sleeping on stomach. My heart beat per minute came down from 67 to 61. I only stopped sugar, everything else was constant.
Okay, these are only 2 cases, it proves nothing. I know. But, I don't care what anyone says about sugar now. I know what I experienced and I believe on that.
And what about the studies that attribute those same maladies to fat, excessive protein intake from red meat, aluminum and countless other factors?
I know people who are fit and well within normal weight, blood pressure, cholesterol and everything else, eat a very healthy diet and they still got diabetes.
One of them lives almost exclusively on home-grown and home-cooked meals (they run a small farm), he's very into working out and is one of the most fit people I know. Yet he has type-2 diabetes.
You're absolutely right that we should all eat less sugar, but there's no great mystery to it.
But, lots of studies have showed sugar is highly related to diabetes, heart disease, mental health etc.. And here you are saying avoid sugar only because of calorie. Like there can't be anything more to it. Where did you get that?
> Insulin promotes synthesis of fatty acids in the liver
> Insulin inhibits breakdown of fat in adipose tissue
...but don't take that to mean "insulin is what gets you fat". It does not... or not as in it being a bad thing. It's more like "insulin just tells your body to process away that damn extra sugar"... and your body does whatever it can with it, like converting it into stored fat. It would be much worse if it didn't! You'd have diabetes then, and that sugar standing unprocessed in you blood would do tons of damage to your body! Making you a bit fatter is kind of the best thing your body can do with the extra sugar that got dumped into your blood...
Also, for cats and dogs, other sugar (xylitol if I member well) can destroy their livers pretty fast. Fortunately, we come from sugar-happy monkeys (that used to eat lots of rottenfruit), so we can safely enjoy our booze in moderation :)
And for extra self-destructive power, mix fructose and fats: your liver will be too overloaded processing the fructose (that btw, also gets transformed to extra fat and collesterol if its other metabolizing pathways get saturated) to be able to handle the fats correctly, so "bad collesterol" will accumulate in you blood, and then clog your arteries (yeah, it needs some extra help from inflamation).
But, oh, wait, there's a name for that: donuts! ...or virtually every other fatty sweet stuff. Oh, and for extra-extra-damage the fats should be fried (for reason I don't have time to detail). And there's a name for that too: KFC + dessert!
Now go enjoy your deserts! Or the fois gras you had before it ;)
EDIT+: video explaining some (older) science behind it, form UCTV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM