I’ve heard that the sweet taste of diet soda could be causing the secretion of insulin (as though sugar were actually entering the bloodstream), causing the body to store fat. It wouldn’t surprise me if these studies had merit.
Diet soda is sweet? I haven’t had a regular soda in 20 years so I don’t know. They were too sweet. That’s why I drink diet soda.
Not the calories.
Science is test/observe.
Not doing real science gets us to bad public policy like Global Warming (Carbon Tax), Gay Marriage (Gay Gene - Born that way, it's not a behavior), etc
What you should worry about long before weight gain on “diet” soda is the side effects (aspartame is a particularly bad little molecule).
There are worse things than fat, like cancer and brain degeneration, and aspartame more likely causes those than “fatness”. At least there have been studies implicating aspartame in those.
When I talk to “fat” people, they are never concerned about this, they just want “something” for “nothing”....as in “tastes like food/drink” but 0 calories.
Remember the low calorie “fat” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olestra Olestra that was basically liquid plastic that was quietly removed from the market? Ever read the “side” effects of it?
Explosive, uncontrollable diarrhea for one......