> 1. Fruit of today is much richer in sugar and available plant tissue than
> fruit of the olden days.

This point is not strictly true, if you have ever eaten wild
strawberries, raspberries etc. in season, you know they are far more
sweet than any domesticated variety (though a lot more work to gather,
so in the end your point is true). I think modern breeders are
aiming for maximum saleability, not sweetness or flavor. So we get
nasty tasting apples like the red "delicious", that have such a hard,
tough skin that they do not bruise and can be shipped and stored
easily. This seems to be true of many fruits, the wild varieties are
super sweet, but only for a very short time, then they spoil. Modern
varieties are never very tasty or sweet, but they can be shipped and
kept without spoiling.


I have eaten wild fruit in Hawaii a number of times
> and am always struck by how many more seeds there are, and how much extra
> work it is.


I agree that now because of our wealth we can gorge on fruit all day
every day, and the effect is as you said, we get too much fruit sugar.
Just wanted to make the point that wild fruits are not always less sweet.