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Metabolic syndrome ties together a host of disorders that the medical community typically thought of as unrelated, or at least having separate and distinct causes – including obesity, high blood pressure, high blood sugar and inflammation – as products of insulin resistance and high circulating insulin levels. Regulatory systems throughout the body begin to misbehave, with slow, chronic, pathological consequences everywhere.
代謝綜合癥將一系列的疾病聯系在一起，而醫療界通常認為這些疾病之間是無關聯的，或者至少是有獨立的、明確的致因的——包括肥胖、高血壓、高血糖和炎癥——是胰島素抵抗和高循環胰島素水平的產物。全身的調節系統開始失調，慢慢地出現了一些難以根治的病癥。
Once we have observed the symptoms of consuming too much sugar, the assumption is that we can dial it back a little and be fine – drink one or two sugary beverages a day instead of three; or, if we're parenting, allow our children ice cream on weekends only, say, rather than as a daily treat. But if it takes years or decades, or even generations, for us to get to the point where we display symptoms of metabolic syndrome, it's quite possible that even these apparently moderate amounts of sugar will turn out to be too much for us to be able to reverse the situation and return us to health. And if the symptom that manifests first is something other than getting fatter – cancer, for instance – we're truly out of luck.
一旦我們發現自己因攝入太多糖出現了一些癥狀，那么我們就可以少喝一點，每天喝一到兩杯含糖飲料，別喝三杯，這樣就好了。或者，如果我們為人父母，那么我們就只允許孩子在周末吃冰淇淋，而不是每天都吃。但是如果我們需要幾年、幾十年，甚至幾代人的時間才會出現代謝綜合癥的癥狀，那么很有可能的情況是，即便是看似適量的糖對我們來說也會過量，而且無法扭轉局面恢復健康。如果首先出現的癥狀不是變胖而是其它什么——比如癌癥——那我們就真的沒那么走運了。
The authorities who argue for moderation in our eating habits tend to be individuals who are relatively lean and healthy; they define moderation as what works for them. This assumes that the same approach and amount will have the same beneficial effect on all of us. If it doesn't, of course, if we fail to remain lean and healthy or our children fail to do so, the assumption is that we've failed – we ate too much sugar, or our children did.
主張飲食適度的權威人士往往是比較苗條、比較健康的人，他們把適度定義為對他們有用的東西。假設同樣的方法和相同的數量對所有人都有同樣的好處。如果沒有，就是說，如果我們沒有保持苗條和健康，或者我們的孩子沒有保持苗條和健康，那么假設就是我們失敗了——我們吃的糖太多了，或者我們的孩子吃的糖太多了。
If it takes 20 years of consuming sugar for the consequences to appear, how can we know whether we've consumed too much before it's too late? Isn't it more reasonable to decide early in life (or early in parenting) that not too much is as little as possible?
如果攝入糖20年后才會產生后果，那么為了避免為時已晚，我們怎樣才能知道自己是否攝入了過多的糖？在人生的早期(或養育孩子的早期)就決定“少而不多”不是更合理嗎？
Any discussion of how little sugar is too much also has to account for the possibility that sugar is a drug and perhaps addictive. Trying to consume sugar in moderation, however it's defined, in a world in which substantial sugar consumption is the norm and virtually unavoidable, is likely to be no more successful for some of us than trying to smoke cigarettes in moderation – just a few a day, rather than a whole pack. Even if we can avoid any meaningful chronic effects by cutting down, we may not be capable of managing our habits, or managing our habits might become the dominant theme in our lives. Some of us certainly find it easier to consume no sugar than to consume a little – no dessert at all, rather than a spoonful or two before pushing the plate to the side.
任何關于糖少即是多的討論都必須考慮到糖是一種藥物的可能性，而且可能會上癮。無論如何定義，在一個大量攝入糖是常態且幾乎不可避免的世界里，吃糖要盡量適量，對我們很多人來說，嘗試攝入適量的糖可能和嘗試吸適量的煙(一天幾根，而不是一天一包)一樣艱難。即便我們可以通過減少攝糖量來避免一些有害的慢性影響，可是我們也可能無法管理我們的習慣，或者管理習慣可能會成為我們生活中的一個重要的主題。有人肯定會發現，不吃糖比吃一點糖更容易——完全不吃甜點，而不是在把盤子拿走之前吃個一勺兩勺的。
