Why Is Water Wet and Why Is It Not: The Wit Behind the Weighty Debate

At the onset, it doesn't need a genius to frivolously say that, yes, water is wet. But there is also an ongoing debate saying it can’t be that simple. In this blog, we dissected the Creatinuum Episode “Is Water Wet?: Unpacking Weirdly Redundant Sentences.”

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels

Perception Matters

The fiasco on whether water is wet depends on how someone defines “wet.” If you perceive being wet as “liquid” or being made of moisture, then you can say that indeed water is wet. With this understanding, you may also say that the ocean is wet.

On the other hand, when you associate wetness as a sensation or a condition of having a solid matter being in contact with any fluid substance, then water, in itself, can’t be wet.  

Based on the second perception, the water can’t actually wet itself, so much like fire can’t burn itself. You can’t wet the water, but it does wet other things. You can't burn fire, but it burns other things. 

To understand further what “wet” means, let’s explore it a bit more.

As a Verb

• You can’t wet water as much as you can wet a towel.

• But you can’t wash your clothes without wetting them. 

• And you should wet your hair before applying a normal shampoo. 

As an Adjective

• You can’t say “wet water” as much as you can say “a wet tissue.”

• The soil became wet after the rain.

• His face is wet with tears.

• You need to change the baby’s diaper as soon as it’s wet.

• As an informal language, you can use the word to describe a drunk person, as in “She was wet last night during the party.”

• It can also mean “wrong,” as in “Her lack of evidence makes her argument weak and can therefore be considered all wet.”

• As an idiom, you can say, “It was hard, but he did a good job when he got his feet wet at a newly launched program,” to express starting a new job. 

As a Noun

Here’s how it gets tricky when it’s used as a noun because it is not that common to use the word that way. 

• But you can say, “The wet on the floor makes it slippery.” 

• In British English, it is safe to use “wet” as “rainy weather,” as in “Bring the plants on the wet outside so they can be watered” or “The ralliest stayed in the wet just to express their redress of grievances.” 

• Also in British English, telling someone is “wet” means that he or she is “weak,” and it can also be a reference to someone “belonging to the moderate or liberal wing of the Conservative party” (Merriam-Webster). 

As a Bonus 

You can actually create a dry water by making a “powdered liquid,” and it’s done when you wrap tiny droplets with silica nanoparticles, which then prevents them from merging (Forbes, 2010). 

Now, does that mean we can actually say that water can really be wet?

Whew! That is so much of a discussion for wet water—oops, maybe not. 

Listen in full to Creatinuum EP95: "Is Water Wet?": Unpacking Weirdly Redundant Sentences available on Simplecast, Spotify, Apple, and other platforms.