ShmoopTube

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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by water.

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It's clearly the right choice.

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Matter can exist in which three states?

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And here are our potential answers.

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[ mumbles ]

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Well, nothing makes us madder than when people say matter doesn't matter.

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Now, matter exists in three different states.

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Unless it's standing at the four corners monument.

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Then it exists in all four states. But, really, just three states.

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To answer this, let's think about what matter is.

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Well, matter is everything.

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Our bed? Matter. The air we breathe? Matter.

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The soda we're drinking? Yep, that's matter.

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And us? Yeah, we're a whole bunch of matter, too.

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And really cool matter, if we toot our own horn a bit.

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The easiest way to answer this question is to think about water.

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When we put water in our freezer, we get ice, a solid.

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Ice, ice, baby.

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When we let ice melt, we get water, a liquid.

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If we decide to, say, boil that water to make some tea,

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we notice steam rising from the pot,

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and that's a gas. So the correct answer here is C.

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Now if only we could remember to refill that ice tray.

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[ ding ]

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