We welcome a guest post today from Carolyn de la Peña, author of Empty Pleasures: The Story of Artificial Sweeteners from Saccharin to Splenda. In her book, de la Pena sheds light on the invention, production, marketing, regulation, and consumption of sugar substitutes such as saccharin, Sucaryl, NutraSweet, and Splenda. In this post, she describes how these "sweet cheats" have fostered troubling and unsustainable eating habits that contribute to America's obesity epidemic.--ellen It seems that everywhere we turn these days there is another news story about obesity in America, particularly among children. "Supersized" portions and...