"David Ball" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 18 Feb 2003 21:11:09 -0500, "Ian St. John"
snip
I have a pretty accurate version of causality. Kindly show me,
Larry, how to start a fire just by putting wood into a pile?

uh, oh.... David. Not to burst your bubble but you *can* do that. In
my
hometown the used to be a large 'pit' that contained rather extensive
piles of 'sawdust'. It would catch fire at regular intervals from
'spontaneous combustion'. Just wood in a pile... ;-)

I didn't ask you about spontaneous combustion, Larry. I asked
you to start a forest fire by piling up wood, the implication being
along the lines of the fuel loading you describe in your original
post. It would be like saying that a person dies because they fall off
a building. As the adage goes, it isn't the fall that kills, but the
sudden stop at the bottom. If falling killed, the mortality rate for
sky-divers would be rather high...like 100%. As I said in my original
reply, fuel loading will certainly exacerbate a fire, but then so will
exceptionally dry conditions. It's just that neither causes the fire.


David. Lighten up a little and check the header.. You must be
overworking a bit... ;-)