This line of discussion rather proves the original point. We don't know if unbounded fruit consumption is bad. Of course unbounded simple sugar consumption is (we think) but some evidence has shown that for whatever reason, sugars directly from fruit enter the blood stream slower. Maybe. :-)

Anecdotal evidence how sweet current fruits are - the difference between wild apples, cherries and strawberries and the ones you can buy in the supermarket.

First about the salt - NaCl is salt so it is chemically quite inert you will have hard time breaking it unless you pump quite a lot of energy (or use elements that are more chemically active than either Na or Cl and there aren't many (lithium, fluorine, hydrogen).

Chlorine is very potent oxidizer that will wreak havoc in all kind of processes.

Sodium will just try to make your intestines into soap - quite unpleasant thing.

But they are chemically different elements.

Fruits are not bad for you in the same way most of the food is not bad for a healthy person. But if you are a person with the metabolic syndrome, high insulin resistance or type 2 diabetes you just cannot assume that a diet of only bananas, ultra sweet apples, pomelo, peaches etc will do you much good.

Of course fruits have the benefit of containing lots of water and pulp so they are digested slower than a can of coke with the same sugar amount which is good.

If you are healthy person eat fruits freely. If you are not be careful with the blind assumptions that they are good for you. Ask someone with great knowledge about human metabolism specifically for your case.

I appreciate your answer, but I feel the need to point out that the original question still stands unanswered. Is there any evidence, weak as it may be, that FRUIT consumption is harmful in any way? (note: not that FRUCTOSE consumption is harmful. I'm aware of that. I'm looking specifically for FRUIT consumption).

> the difference between wild apples, cherries and strawberries and the ones you can buy in the supermarket.

Anecdotal, of course, but while I haven't had a chance to pick wild apples or cherries, I did have a chance to pick wile strawberries, raspberries and blackberries - and they were just as sweet and perhaps even sweeter than those I buy at the supermarket. They _were_ much smaller and not as nice looking, but were extremely sweet. Similarly for grapes.

I know for sure that e.g. industrially grown tomatoes have been optimized for size and looks at the EXPENSE of sugar (and other nutriet) content. This might also be true for other fruits and vegetables.

> NaCl is salt so it is chemically quite inert

That's exactly my point. It's possible that fruit is "inert" in its sugar effect - studies about pure fructose consumption are potentially irrelevant.

> But if you are a person with the metabolic syndrome, high insulin resistance or type 2 diabetes you just cannot assume that a diet of only bananas, ultra sweet apples, pomelo, peaches etc will do you much good.

Of course, but that's begging the question. If you are a person who suffers from hypertension, than you cannot assume that regular salt intake is good for you! But it is, for 80% of the cases - the remaining 20% being the salt-sensitive hypertension people.

You cannot assume that such a fruit diet will do much bad either. Doing so is blind faith. And that's exactly pron's point.

> Ask someone with great knowledge about human metabolism specifically for your case.

I've been looking for someone like that, but it seems that there are non to be found. Specifically, everything about my metabolism falls outside accepted wisdom; You'd expect the experts to want to look at evidence contradicting their predictions to learn to improve their predictions - but after talking to 30 or so "experts", I have not found one who has such an interest.

Pure sodium is an extremely reactive metal. It's so reactive that it doesn't occur in nature - for example, if you drop it in water, it'll explode. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODf_sPexS2Q)

So, yes, it's probably lethal.

> e.g.: Table sugar is 50% fructose - however, it is not associated with the same kind of problems that pure fructose is associated with.

Table sugar consumption is indeed bad for you only because of its 50% of fructose.

So, you claim that pure glucose has no known health problems associated with it? (If I understand correctly this is an equivalent claim to what you say, since the other 50% is glucose).

A random google search (e.g. see http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2011/jan2011_Glucose-The-Sile... ) indicates that this belief is not part of the consensus. Care to back that up?