Editing Fire (section)

==== Early human control ====
{{Main|Control of fire by early humans}}
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The ability to control fire was a dramatic change in the habits of early humans.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gowlett |first1=J. A. J. |title=The discovery of fire by humans: a long and convoluted process |journal=[[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B|Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences]] |date=2016 |volume=371 |issue=1696 |pages=20150164 |doi=10.1098/rstb.2015.0164 |pmid=27216521 |pmc=4874402 |doi-access=free}}</ref> [[Making fire]] to generate heat and light made it possible for people to [[cooking|cook]] food, simultaneously increasing the variety and availability of nutrients and reducing disease by killing pathogenic microorganisms in the food.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Gowlett |first1=J. A. J. |last2=Wrangham |first2=R. W. |date=2013 |title=Earliest fire in Africa: towards the convergence of archaeological evidence and the cooking hypothesis |journal=Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa |volume=48 |issue=1 |pages=5–30 |doi=10.1080/0067270X.2012.756754 |s2cid=163033909}}</ref> The heat produced would also help people stay warm in cold weather, enabling them to live in cooler climates. Fire also kept nocturnal predators at bay. Evidence of occasional cooked food is found from {{Ma|1.0}},<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Kaplan |first1=Matt |year=2012 |title=Million-year-old ash hints at origins of cooking |url=https://www.nature.com/news/million-year-old-ash-hints-at-origins-of-cooking-1.10372 |url-status=live |journal=Nature |doi=10.1038/nature.2012.10372 |s2cid=177595396 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191001174313/http://www.nature.com/news/million-year-old-ash-hints-at-origins-of-cooking-1.10372 |archive-date=1 October 2019 |access-date=25 August 2020}}</ref> suggesting it was used in a controlled fashion.<ref>{{cite web |last=O'Carroll |first=Eoin |date=5 April 2012 |title=Were Early Humans Cooking Their Food a Million Years Ago? |url=https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/early-humans-cooking-food-million-years-ago/story?id=16080804#.T4IyWe1rFDI |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200204145413/https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/early-humans-cooking-food-million-years-ago/story?id=16080804#.T4IyWe1rFDI |archive-date=4 February 2020 |access-date=10 January 2020 |work=ABC News |quote=Early humans harnessed fire as early as a million years ago, much earlier than previously thought, suggests evidence unearthed in a cave in South Africa.}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | first1=Francesco | last1=Berna | first2=Paul | last2=Goldberg | first3=Liora Kolska | last3=Horwitz | first4=Michael | last4=Chazan |date=May 15, 2012 |title=Microstratigraphic evidence of in situ fire in the Acheulean strata of Wonderwerk Cave, Northern Cape province, South Africa |journal=PNAS |volume=109 |issue=20 |pages=E1215–E1220 |doi=10.1073/pnas.1117620109 |pmc=3356665 |pmid=22474385 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Other sources put the date of regular use at 400,000 years ago.<ref name="Bowman2009b">{{cite journal |last1=Bowman |first1=D. M. J. S. |last2=Balch |first2=J. K. |last3=Artaxo |first3=P. |last4=Bond |first4=W. J. |last5=Carlson |first5=J. M. |last6=Cochrane |first6=M. A. |last7=d'Antonio |first7=C. M. |last8=Defries |first8=R. S. |last9=Doyle |first9=J. C. |last10=Harrison |first10=S. P. |last11=Johnston |first11=F. H. |last12=Keeley |first12=J. E. |last13=Krawchuk |first13=M. A. |last14=Kull |first14=C. A. |last15=Marston |first15=J. B. |year=2009 |title=Fire in the Earth system |journal=Science |volume=324 |issue=5926 |pages=481–84 |bibcode=2009Sci...324..481B |doi=10.1126/science.1163886 |pmid=19390038 |s2cid=22389421 |last16=Moritz |first16=M. A. |last17=Prentice |first17=I. C. |last18=Roos |first18=C. I. |last19=Scott |first19=A. C. |last20=Swetnam |first20=T. W. |last21=Van Der Werf |first21=G. R. |last22=Pyne |first22=S. J. |url=https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechAUTHORS:20090707-150808418 |access-date=2024-01-26 |archive-date=2024-05-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240527111415/https://authors.library.caltech.edu/records/m358a-0c317 |url-status=live }}</ref> Evidence becomes widespread around 50 to 100 thousand years ago, suggesting regular use from this time; resistance to [[air pollution]] started to evolve in human populations at a similar point in time.<ref name="Bowman2009b" /> The use of fire became progressively more sophisticated, as it was used to create charcoal and to control wildlife from tens of thousands of years ago.<ref name="Bowman2009b" />

[[File:Potjiekos over a fire.gif|thumb|Here, food is cooked in a [[Potjie|cauldron]] above fire in [[South Africa]].]]
By the [[Neolithic Revolution]], during the introduction of grain-based agriculture, people all over the world used fire as a tool in [[landscape]] management. These fires were typically [[controlled burn]]s or "cool fires", as opposed to uncontrolled "hot fires", which damage the soil. Hot fires destroy plants and animals, and endanger communities.<ref>{{cite book |last=Pyne |first=Stephen J. |title=Advances in Historical Ecology |date=1998 |publisher=University of Columbia Press |isbn=0-231-10632-7 |editor-last=Balée |editor-first=William |series=Historical Ecology Series |pages=78–84 |chapter=Forged in Fire: History, Land and Anthropogenic Fire |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A5cUpbvNcH4C&pg=PA76 }}</ref> This is especially a problem in the forests of today where traditional burning is prevented in order to encourage the growth of timber crops. Cool fires are generally conducted in the spring and autumn. They clear undergrowth, burning up [[biomass]] that could trigger a hot fire should it get too dense. They provide a greater variety of environments, which encourages game and plant diversity. For humans, they make dense, impassable forests traversable.<ref>{{cite journal | title=Fire as a forest management tool: prescribed burning in the southern United States | last1=Wade | first1=D. D. | last2=Lundsford | first2=J. | year=1990 | journal=Unasylva | volume=41 | issue=3 | pages=28–38 | url=https://www.fao.org/4/t9500e/t9500e07.htm | access-date=2025-02-25 }}</ref>

Another human use for fire in regards to landscape management is its use to clear land for agriculture. [[Slash-and-burn]] agriculture is still common across much of tropical Africa, Asia and South America. For small farmers, controlled fires are a convenient way to clear overgrown areas and release nutrients from standing vegetation back into the soil.<ref name="blogs.ei.columbia.edu">{{cite web |last=Krajick |first=Kevin |date=16 November 2011 |title=Farmers, Flames and Climate: Are We Entering an Age of 'Mega-Fires'? – State of the Planet |url=http://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2011/11/16/farmers-flames-and-climate-are-we-entering-an-age-of-mega-fires/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120526005052/http://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2011/11/16/farmers-flames-and-climate-are-we-entering-an-age-of-mega-fires/ |archive-date=2012-05-26 |access-date=2012-05-23 |publisher=Columbia Climate School}}</ref> However, this useful strategy is also problematic. Growing population, fragmentation of forests and warming climate are making the earth's surface more prone to ever-larger escaped fires. These harm ecosystems and human infrastructure, cause health problems, and send up spirals of carbon and soot that may encourage even more warming of the atmosphere – and thus feed back into more fires. Globally today, as much as 5 million square kilometres – an area more than half the size of the United States – burns in a given year.<ref name="blogs.ei.columbia.edu" />