The current scientific consensus says no unless there are issues with digestion.

That said, there are other potential benefits and issues. People tend to forget how energy dense sucrose is. Only fats are denser. (incl. nuts which are mainly fat and protein) So whatever you are replacing them with, you will eat much of, unless it is fat or oils. Or you will lose weight.

Sugar contains just 25% more calories compared with cereals while oils and animal fats contain over 2 times more calories. So if one just stops to eat sugar without changing the composition of the food, it is trivial to compensate calory loss with eating, for example, bread made without sugar but with extra oil.

But the article is not about just removing the sugar. As the author discovered, just by giving up on sugar one changes the whole diet. He could no longer consume any junk food and had to start cooking himself. So the real benefits could be in that switch, not in avoiding sugar per se.

> He already had a relatively healthy diet. He was counting calories.

Right. Which makes the 12 lbs lost over 2 weeks very suspect.

> The question is will replacing a couple hundred calories of sugar with something healthy, like nuts for example, cause one to lose weight?

Yes, but with all diets, it will be temporary.