Usually there’s a significant amount of ions in a flame, enough to make a little conductive. That’s where the plasma characterization comes from
Comment on What even is fire?
Kolanaki@pawb.social 1 week ago
I heard it was plasma once, but I don’t know if that’s true. Plasma is state of matter. Is burning a state of matter? 🤔
reptar@lemmy.world 1 week ago
dnick@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
No, is just a reaction from two molecules into two other molecules. Oversimplification, but you know how vinegar and baking soda react when the come together all fuzzy and bubble? It’s the same when oxygen and hydrocarbons meet, except that it take heat to get it going, and conveniently releases more heat, which is usually enough to cause more reaction, often until it runs out of either oxygen or the hydrocarbon.
It would be an even better parallel if vinegar and baking soda didn’t react if they were both below a certain temperature, and if the bubbling created heat, which warmed up the stuff next to it. If that were the case you could see a cool thing where you could keep them could, and just touch one spot to start them reacting, and it would spread like ‘fire’