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submitted 4 days ago by loomy@lemy.lol to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[-] AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 53 points 4 days ago

Wouldn't it evaporate in like 5 seconds, then? Also, drainage would be the easiest thing ever. Don't even need a slanted floor.

[-] ryedaft@sh.itjust.works 17 points 4 days ago

That'd be awful. You want the stuff in water out of your house, not precipitated all over the floor.

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[-] Admetus@sopuli.xyz 28 points 4 days ago

Sounds like a lot less cleaning in the house as it would just evaporate in less than a minute?

[-] REDACTED@infosec.pub 3 points 4 days ago

High humidity tends to ruin a lot of houses/construction materials over time, but you'll likely first notice random spores

[-] Azzu@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 4 days ago

I mean you can just ventilate whenever you spill something.

The larger problem would be the entire water-based ecosystem.

[-] Admetus@sopuli.xyz 2 points 3 days ago

We need xkcd to explain what would happen on a large scale if water was like this.

[-] Archangel1313@lemmy.ca 23 points 4 days ago

Your floor would have to be supernaturally flat and level for that to happen.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 18 points 4 days ago
[-] Hadriscus@jlai.lu 8 points 4 days ago

the world is crooked ! reality is a lie !

[-] meyotch@slrpnk.net 5 points 4 days ago

Lambs to the cosmic slaughter!

[-] Hadriscus@jlai.lu 4 points 4 days ago

ah yes ! that's the one

[-] umbrella@lemmy.ml 3 points 4 days ago

is this show still any good? after roilland was kicked out for being a creep i mean.

[-] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 3 points 3 days ago

As someone who didn't like most of seasons 5 and 6, yes, it's gotten better. There are some really good episodes in 7 and 8. There are still duds, but the quality ratio is better than it was.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 2 points 3 days ago

I liked it through the last season I watched, which was there season after the big gap. 5, I think? I don't watch a lot of TV, and I don't fanboi very well; was that after he left?

[-] Wilzax@lemmy.world 15 points 4 days ago

You could also clean it by putting a cloth in the lowest point it would run to so this sounds like a win to me

[-] yuri@pawb.social 7 points 4 days ago

i think without surface tension it would also just fall out of the cloth as soon as you lift it, because nothing would wick against gravity. in fact of your floor is pourous at all, i reckon the water would just immediately all flow further down and you’d be left with a dry floor.

[-] bleistift2@sopuli.xyz 6 points 4 days ago

Oil doesn’t have surface tension and it stays in the cloth. At a certain point it’s not surface tension that keeps liquids together but friction.

Says my uneducated ass.

[-] yuri@pawb.social 4 points 4 days ago

oils have low surface tension, i believe a true no-surface tension liquid is as impossible as a true frictionless surface.

i didn’t consider friction though! i think the rag would still dry out completely pretty quick, but you might have a few seconds while the water falls out depending on how tight the mesh is?

i dunno, this is a real whacky thing to think about!

[-] marcos@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

Without surface tension it would stick to whatever thing attracts it more. And a normal piece of cloth attracts water way more than a normal non-carpet floor.

But it also wouldn't flow freely as the GP expects either. Some oils have almost no surface tension, and they are famously a nightmare to clean up.

As a positive, the water would evaporate faster.

[-] yuri@pawb.social 2 points 4 days ago

the cloth attracts it because of the capillary action pulling water into the gaps therein, and capillary action relies on surface tension! i think without outside forces like suction, the liquid in this scenario would never flow against gravity.

i think hahah

[-] marcos@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

Surface tension doesn't tell you anything about the cloth-water interface.

[-] yuri@pawb.social 1 points 2 days ago

late reply but i ONLY JUST CONSIDERED, the cloth would most likely have some static charge which WOULD result in a literal “attraction force” towards the water!

physics is so stupid, i love it so much

[-] yuri@pawb.social 2 points 4 days ago

i mean it’s literally why liquids wick into cloth

[-] schnokobaer@feddit.org 23 points 4 days ago

But that 2 micron puddle would also evaporate in 2 microseconds!

[-] Gladaed@feddit.org 18 points 4 days ago

We would probably just not exist as liquids that want to hold together are pretty essential. Even if you just imagine blood not leaving your body through the tiniest nick.

[-] Psionicsickness@reddthat.com 8 points 4 days ago

I mean maybe? Surface tension play a role in blood staying on the wound, but it’s the blood itself that clots. I think the bigger issue would be your eyes, but maybe evolution creates a light sensor that wasn’t developed underwater…

I’m at a loss. In my heart of hearts I know we all die if water doesn’t tend to hold together, but I can’t think of WHY. Call xkcd.

[-] Nakoichi@hexbear.net 17 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Technically even without surface tension, the microscopically small deviations in elevation in your floor, combined with evaporation and absorption would actually mean you would have a dry floor almost immediately.

Surface tension is just one aspect of the molecular bonds that cause water to accumulate, and if there were no surface tension that would mean those bonds would have to be nonexistent and thus water would not be able to condense into a liquid in the first place.

nerd

[-] Flyberius@hexbear.net 5 points 4 days ago

Ok, nerd....

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[-] Gwaer@lemmy.world 12 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Wouldn’t it just be a superfluid at that point? Those things are ungovernable. We’d have way more problems that just spilled puddles. They crawl out of the beakers on their own. It’d be an absolute nightmare.

My bad superfluids are 0 viscosity not surface tension carry on we’re safe.

[-] racketlauncher831@lemmy.ml 4 points 4 days ago

I heard about superfluid crawling out of a container. But I wonder in this case, what works the fluid against the gravity upward the wall of the container?

[-] TeddE@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

Capillary action; which is a combination of adhesion, cohesion, and surface tension and for superfluids the additional ack of friction.

Unfortunately, if cohesion is removed from water, this might drastically change if the water can crawl up the container (the details would be based on the specific physics of this imaginary universe).

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[-] Zerush@lemmy.ml 3 points 4 days ago

It cleans not only your floor, but also the ceilings and floors of the neighbors which are living below.

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[-] judgyweevil@feddit.it 14 points 4 days ago

That's how water works in videogames

[-] vonxylofon@lemmy.world 17 points 4 days ago
[-] judgyweevil@feddit.it 5 points 4 days ago

Water just doesn't work in minecraft

[-] loomy@lemy.lol 4 points 4 days ago
[-] monk@lemmy.unboiled.info 7 points 4 days ago

good news: it wouldn't be

[-] PillowD@lemmy.world 6 points 4 days ago
[-] NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone 6 points 4 days ago

Probably our bodies would instantly collapse into ooze like that guy in the first X-Men.

[-] And009@lemmynsfw.com 5 points 4 days ago

Assuming my home is perfectly level, which it is not

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[-] sxan@midwest.social 5 points 4 days ago

Would capillary action still work, or does it depend on surface tension? I'm thinking about superfluids. Would the water stop at covering the floor?

[-] Venus_Ziegenfalle@feddit.org 7 points 4 days ago

You can try it yourself by adding a drop of dish soap to some water. Capillary action would still work and the water would evaporate long before covering the entire floor.

[-] I_am_10_squirrels@beehaw.org 3 points 4 days ago

Capillary rise depends on surface tension, gamma. If surface tension was 0, there would be no capillary rise. Soap decreases surface tension, but it's not 0.

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[-] Collatz_problem@hexbear.net 4 points 4 days ago

Spilling liquid helium to achieve this.

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[-] 58008@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

What if each H~2~O molecule was coated in a hydrophobic substance?

[-] mathemachristian@hexbear.net 1 points 3 days ago

In this case human dwellings would be built to accomodate for this, since it's basically impossible to wipe up any water puddle. Builders would have to come up with some technology (drains in every room, floor heating as the norm to evaporate the 2µm water film etc.) or risk water damage. So you'd never have to wipe up a puddle since your apartment would have been built in a way that allows for the cleaning of water in other ways.

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this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2025
602 points (99.2% liked)

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