What is fire

✎ This article/section is a stub — some half-sorted notes, not necessarily checked, not necessarily correct. Feel free to ignore, or tell me about it.

A surprisingly good question.

Multiple good ones, in fact, including:

what does it contain?

what is is that we see?

how much does fire vary based on what it contains?

why can the thing we see be so big?

Is a lot of fuel being propelled while oxidation is relatively slow?

is there energy exciting electrons and causing sort-of-secondary light?

Is plasma involved or not?