00:01is water wet it is an argument that has torn apart common sections across the internet mostly
00:07because the answer seems so obvious if you plunge your hand into a pool of water your body immediately
00:13tells you that you are wet but there is a glaring biological glitch in that assumption human beings
00:19do not actually possess wetness receptors anywhere in their skin your brain is actively fabricating
00:24the sensation to tell you that you are wet your nervous system runs a quick calculation it detects
00:30drops in temperature using your cold receptors and mathematically combines them with changes in
00:35texture and weight from your pressure receptors when you put on a soaked t-shirt or wipe down a
00:40counter the unmistakable vivid feeling of wetness you experience is entirely a neurological illusion
00:46if our own nervous system is actively hallucinating this feeling based on temperature and weight
00:51human sensation is a completely untrustworthy judge for this debate to find the actual truth
00:56we bypass human biology and look strictly at physics physicists define wetness as a specific condition
01:04a liquid successfully infiltrating and adhering to a solid surface look at this molecular animation
01:10water is composed of one oxygen atom and two hydrogen atoms because of those hydrogen bonds
01:16h2o molecules have an extreme tendency to snap together and hold on tightly to one another
01:22physicists call this cohesion that massive cohesive force creates high surface tension the water
01:28molecules form a rigid cliquey cluster that aggressively defends its boundaries and refuses to break apart for
01:34external objects but wetness requires the exact opposite force adhesion adhesion is a molecule's ability to let go of
01:42its own kind reach out and grab onto a completely foreign material like a glass window or a human hand
01:48here is the ultimate physical irony because water's internal cohesion is so powerful it actively resists adhesion
01:56chemically speaking water is actually fighting against making things wet to see what a highly adhesive liquid
02:04actually looks like you can test everyday rubbing alcohol alcohol molecules have much weaker cohesive forces
02:10which allows them to easily spread out and saturate a solid surface far better than water can
02:16if you zoom in to the sub microscopic level water's ability to be wet breaks down entirely
02:22a cluster containing fewer than six water molecules physically cannot behave as a liquid
02:27it requires the addition of a sixth molecule to instantly trigger a geometric transformation into a fluid state
02:34without achieving that liquid state first these tiny water clusters are incapable of adhering to a solid surface
02:41they cannot participate in the physics of wetness in fact water is so naturally bad at wetting surfaces that
02:48laboratories use a specific concept called wet water researchers inject water with chemical wetting agents to
02:55artificially destroy its surface tension finally forcing the liquid to spread and penetrate under the strict rules of
03:02thermodynamics water itself is never inherently wet it is simply a physical delivery mechanism that imposes a temporary state of
03:11wetness
03:11that imposes a temporary state of wetness onto other objects zooming out from the microscopic scale we can see water
03:16as a
03:17macro planetary force and compared to almost every other known substance in the universe its physical profile is incredibly bizarre
03:25water defies thermal logic by becoming less dense as it freezes because ice floats it forms an insulating top layer
03:33on lakes and oceans
03:35preventing the entire water column from freezing solid and killing the life beneath its polar molecular structure also makes it
03:42the universal solvent
03:43it can dissolve and carry essential minerals and nutrients into every cell of a biological organism
03:49these physical anomalies the stubborn cohesion the insulating ice the chemical transport collectively establish the environment required for biological life
04:00but there is a counter-argument language scholars concede that standard dictionary definitions outline the word wet simply as being
04:09made of liquid
04:10by that metric water instantly qualifies as being wet this flexible linguistic loophole
04:17sits in direct opposition to the physicists rigid unyielding requirement of solid adhesion
04:22resolving this debate requires you to decide which framework holds more authority in defining our reality
04:28do you trust the absolute measurable laws of physics or do you defer to the social constructs of human language
04:35so we are leaving the final verdict to you are you team physics or team dictionary drop your ruling in
04:42the comments below to settle the debate
04:43and while you are down there make sure to subscribe to the channel for more deep dives into the science
04:48of everyday life
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