Quote:
Originally posted by Sapper
The portion of the ice cube not submerged is a fraction of the portion that is. This "undisplaced" mass is essentially negligible.
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No. Its not negligible unless you ignore the difference in densities between ice and water (which is the whole point of this problem).
The mass of water displaced by the ice is equal to the mass of ice.
So the volume of water displaced is (m_ice)/(density_water).
When all the ice has melted, its mass stays the same, so it contributes a volume (m_ice)/(density_water).
The volume is the same before and after.