Everyone knows fruits have seeds.

Apples have seeds. Pears have seeds. Pomegranates have seeds. All of them are fruits. And even though bananas are seedless, watermelons could be seedless, and we wish lemons were seedless, they are still fruits. Some are modified for human consumption, but nevertheless, fruits have seeds.

Zucchini is a fruit. As are cucumbers, corn, bell peppers, eggplants, and pumpkins. Legumes are fruits too. So, add to the list beans, lentils, and peanuts. Avocados are fruits—they are berries, like cherries and grapes—though we like to classify them as vegetables, because no one would dare call guacamole a fruit salad.

Cotton is a fruit. Not a tasty one, but still, it is a fruit. Coffee beans come from fruit. The same is true of cocoa, the bean that makes chocolate.

Again, fruits have seeds. Simple as that. Okra. Squash. Wheat. Fruit. Fruit. Fruit. It’s true. Look it up.

So, if fruits are so easily identified, what exactly are vegetables?

It turns out, vegetables do not really exist. The word “vegetable” is an arbitrary word given to any non-fruit part of the crops in our diet. It derives from the Latin vegetare, which means “growing.” When the word moved into French, it meant “alive.” So far, etymology is not helping the cause.

The umbrella term we are familiar with, which encompasses foods like celery and carrots, was not used until 1767. (It is uncanny to think William Shakespeare, who died in 1616, could describe a rose so eloquently, but calling a potato by any other name was beyond his capacity.)

Still the modern definition of “vegetable” is quite vague. Some websites define it as: “any plant part consumed for food that is not a fruit or seed, but including mature fruits that are eaten as part of a main meal.” Thanks for clearing that up, Wikipedia. Really. You have been a tremendous help.

The definition boils down to this: if fruits are defined as the part of the plant associated with seeds, then vegetables are the catch-all for everything else—any edible part of a plant that is not the fruit. So that includes the root (as in carrots, potatoes, or turnips), the stem (celery, asparagus, or fennel), or the leaf (spinach, arugula, or kale).

But even that definition is lax. Some foods we refer to as “vegetables” are not even plants, but fungi (e.g. mushrooms and yeast), which are live organisms and are more closely related to animals than anything else.

Even when one searches ‘the oldest vegetable in the human diet’, one arrives at the green pea, which has been consumed for nearly 10,000 years. The only problem is the green pea is a legume and therefore a fruit, not a vegetable.

The idea that a vegetable can be whatever the hell we want it to be is essentially the point. Consider the tomato, which has seeds—lots of them. That makes the tomato a fruit. Full stop. This should not even be up for debate.

Yet, in 1893, the Supreme Court of the United States declared the tomato a vegetable, for the purpose of aligning with the Tariff Act of 1890. Behind closed doors, however, the justices admitted that the tomato was indeed a fruit. (This would not be the only time SCOTUS has declared a ruling because of a monetary incentive, but that’s for a different discussion.)

Some people define “fruits” and “vegetables” not according to botanical classification, but by how one prepares them for consumption. Beans, tomatoes, and bell peppers—although fruits by definition—are referred to as vegetables because they complement savory dishes like chili and ragu. Strawberries and blueberries are unanimously referred to as fruits, because they make for good jellies and pies. But even this definition has a gray area. People squeeze lemon—a fruit—onto fish. The French caramelize onions—a vegetable—to make jam. And heathens put pineapple—a seedless fruit—on pizza.

So, at the end of the day, what exactly is a vegetable?

The answer is: it depends.

A vegetable could be the root of a plant, but not all plant roots are vegetables. It could be the stalk or leaves of a plant, but again, not all the time. A vegetable could even be a living organism, but only if it is a fungus, and only then a very particular fungus.

This is all rather confusing, so let’s just stick with the definition that a vegetable is any part of an edible plant that is not a fruit. Even then, some fruits will always be misbranded as vegetables.