LogFAQs > #946576271

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Because water molecules are 3 dimensional.

And even if we operate under the simplification of saying that planes that are only one atom thick are 2-dimensional (which is incorrect, but not an unreasonable bit of rounding for general purposes), the crystal structure formed when water freezes is definitely 3D. Even if we take the rounding even further, that crystal structure forms hexagonal shapes, not right angles, meaning you have to get pretty large (and, by extension, quite a bit thicker than 2-dimensional) before those hexagons resolve into the straight lines and right angles needed to have a square.

OS 12TR posted...

You could think of that an ice cube is made up of an infinite number of ice squares.

I'm not sure you could, actually. The ice cube can be subdivided into a finite, definite number of sheets of ice or water molecules. Even if you subdivide further than that (at which point, calling it "ice" wouldn't really be accurate anyway because that's very much a superatomic concept), even the smallest subatomic particles still have non-zero radii, meaning you would still be looking at a finite number.

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