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polymathwannabe comments on Linguistic mechanisms for less wrong cognition - Less Wrong Discussion
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In that case it seems that a short preposition for "containing" is missing.
Language isn't easy. If you just know the rules, it's hard to know that a teacup might not contain tea while a cup of tea does. It get's even more confusing because the same object that's a teacup when it's intended to store tea liquids suddenly becomes a bowl when it's intended to contain soup.
Strangely, the same people who object to "a glass of water" have no problem with "a bottle of soda," "a pot of potatoes" or "a truck of pigs".
But is a bottle of soda still a bottle of soda if it's empty?
(I think it would also be nice, if you add the spanish translation for those terms you are speaking about)
Bottle of soda = botella de gaseosa
An empty bottle of soda would still be called a bottle of soda, which makes me suspect that the actual meaning is closer to "bottle for soda."
Glass of water = vaso de agua
Pot of potatoes = olla de papas
Truck of pigs = camión de cerdos
Some defenders of the "glass of water" team argue that the peculiarity that makes the phrase valid is not the preposition, but the noun vaso (glass), which must be understood as a unit of measure, just like "spoonful of sugar." But I don't agree that that's the reason why "glass of water" is the right form. Nobody thinks a "truck" is a unit of measure (though some regional forms of Spanish do have a word for truckload, "camionado").