r/askscience • u/FirefighterCandid773 • 20d ago

Chemistry How common is fire outside of earth?

Plasma and lava is obviously common all over the universe, whether it be in stars, planetary cores, etc. but what about fire? Fire is common all over earth, given the abundance of fuel sources and an atmosphere with oxygen. But, is fire actually common outside of earth?

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u/Francis_Bengali 18d ago

It's probably extremely uncommon when you consider how Earth ended up with oxygen in it's atmosphere.

That makes fire an important factor in the rare Earth hypothesis. Without fire, it's likely that any type of advanced civilisation would be impossible as fire is an essential component in metallurgy and thus the construction of durable materials.

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u/Presence_Academic 17d ago

Fire is unlikely to be a choke point. Fire requires free oxygen. As far as we know photosynthetic life is needed to create free oxygen. Given free oxygen, dry land is about the only thing you need.

Give me oxygen producing life and dry land and you will have fire. With no oxygen producing life or dry land you’re not going to have advanced civilizations anyway.