Combustion occurs because objects contain phlogiston, an invisible substance released during burning. The more phlogiston an object contained, the more vigorously it would burn.
The phlogiston theory dominated 17th and 18th-century chemistry but was replaced after Lavoisier's experiments in the 1770s-1780s demonstrated that combustion involves oxidation, the combination of substances with oxygen. Modern chemistry explains burning as an exothermic chemical reaction where a substance combines with oxygen.
Reception
Sources
- History of Science: Phlogiston REFERENCE
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Phlogiston REFERENCE