So, let’s say you write down the words “fire is a chain reaction between carbon and oxygen that produces heat”. You’ve characterised fire yes, but is that sentence itself the fire?

Let’s say you write down the equation describing this reaction so you can play with it and manipulate it. Is this fire, or just a convenient way to talk about it?

I’d argue neither of these are fire, and both will never completely describe a fire (though they come damn close).