My answer is, under 3 season conditions, why bother with either? When I was hiking in New Zealand a while back, I wore full leather Asolo boots with either wool socks or Patagonia's expedition socks. When I came to a river, which is fairly frequent down there, I would just walk across, stop, wring out my socks, dump any excess water out my boots, put them back on and start walking again. After a short while, the socks would dry out. Both the wool and Patagonia socks are warm, even when wet.

In winter (snow conditions), you want to keep your feet as dry as possible to keep them warm, especially in extreme temps, but the rest of the time, that isn't as important. Waterproof socks will cause your feet to sweat anyway, so I'm not sure how useful they are.

btw, the one thing I would never do is cross a river in bare feet or soft water mocs of some sort, too much chance that you will wind up cutting up your feet or slipping and falling.

Another option is to wear whatever you want and when it gets wet, use something like a Neos overboot over them. Some people hike in winter in running shoes inside a pair of Neos boots. I don't have a pair, but have read good things about them.

www.overshoe.com