The big issue, addressed in part in the linked article, is that processed foods have been engineered to fool the body's natural hunger and satiety signaling. Th

The big issue, addressed in part in the linked article, is that processed foods have been engineered to fool the body's natural hunger and satiety signaling. They've been relentlessly tested and optimized to maximize enjoyment and minimize fullness or desire to stop (this point on the curve being the so-called "bliss point" alluded to in the article). It's possible, and perhaps likely, that the body treats processed fats very differently from natural fats. But the real crux of the issue is everything the fats come packaged in. In an almond, the fat comes packaged with a lot of fiber, a decent amount of protein, and a host of other nutrients. In a handful of Cheetos, the fat comes packaged with an array of chemicals designed to circumvent satiety signals, plus a lot of salt, sugar, and other goodies thrown in for good measure. Dietitians like to draw comparisons between, say, the nutritional profile of a single serving of almonds vs. the nutritional profile of a single serving of Cheetos. But who eats just one serving of Cheetos? That's the real issue. It's pretty hard to eat natural foods to excess; it's exceedingly easy to eat artificial foods to excess. In other words: it's not simply that artificial ingredients, in and of themselves, are bad. It's that artificial ingredients are intentionally combined in ways to increase caloric density and decrease the brain's recognition of said density.