Is the Fischer Esterification mechanism very simplified?

Example mechanism:
![mechanism](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d7/Fischer_esterification_mechanism.svg/2000px-Fischer_esterification_mechanism.svg.png)
Is that very simplified, or is that pretty much what is very likely happening at the molecular/atomic level when you do the reaction in real life? (Of course besides the free $\ce{H+}$, that is obviously hydronium, protonated alcohols, or the acid itself.)




That is the wrong question to ask. Mechanisms are putative pathways. Accepted mechanisms are mechanisms that we have not found evidence to refute. There is no way to determine whether a mechanism is the true mechanism.


 5

What Zhe has said is undoubtedly correct.


However, the currently accepted mechanism that is taught in lectures typically represents exactly our understanding of how a mechanism would work. There may be non-productive side steps, there may be backwards and forwards shuffling, but the effective pathway that a molecule takes will — under the assumption that the mechanism is correct at all — happen in pretty much exactly that order.


 2