When I first heard a guy talk about how rare sweets are in nature it finally clicked for me why sugar is so addictive. For thousands of years humans rarely had the amount of sugar they had even in the beginning of that chart.
Think about it. They would have seasonal access in some areas to fruit and berries but in many regions of the world they didn't have access to much at all. They might have had honey, but this would not be a staple. So they would have to eat meat and forage for whatever they could find.
Now we have sugar in everything. No wonder it is so hard to say no to. Ancient man would of course eat all the sugar he could for the energy. Its basically a drug to humans. In small douses maybe harmless but in vast quantities it creates problems like most things do.
The industrial revolution improved productivity and made sugar more affordable to the masses. Prior to that, only the aristocracy could afford it. It is said that King Louis XIV of France had rotten teeth, and bad mouth breath because of his overindulgence of sugar.
Later on, the discovery of HFCS (screenshot) and government subsidies made it even more affordable...
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