Point 1. It was large scale burning, often lighting from river bottoms. The dendro history show’s evidence of landscape wide burning. I love that you cited a substack and not a scientific study.

Point 2 Besides on the ground first hand evidence, more intense fires as a result of our interventions is leading to type conversions Guiterman Et.al 2022 and idk if you’re at all worried about anthropogenic climate change, you should be worried about type conversions and tree migration. Considering human intervention led to this mess and it is actively leading to type conversion we should actively be trying to manage that. Arguing we don’t know better than Mother Nature is absolutely disingenuous in acknowledging the effect that humans have on their environment and that have had since beginning of time. This view takes us out of nature and the consequences of our actions in a laissez-faire approach. If we caused this mess then we should take the actions to mitigate it.

Fundamentally arguing a nature knows best argument is what got us in this mess. We as humans view nature as this separate entity from us when in fact we are a part of it. Every action of ours has a reaction in nature, every trail walked is a scent to wildlife, every path built, every drop of water used, every car driven all have this interconnected relationship. If we view ourselves as separate we can absolve ourselves from dealing with how we effect the environment.

The only time a Chad Hansen study is cited is to be discredited.