More accurately, you are stars or at least made from stars.
How can that be? Well, 99% of the mass of the human body is
made up of six elements: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen,
calcium, and phosphorus. The remaining one percent is a
combination of Potassium, Sulfur, Sodium, Magnesium, Copper,
Zinc, Selenium, Molybdenum, Fluorine, Chlorine, Iodine,
Manganese, Cobalt, Iron, and trace amounts of Lithium,
Strontium, Aluminum, Silicon, Lead, Vanadium, Arsenic, and
Bromine. But how does this relate to being made from stars?
If we subscribe to the “Big Bang” creation of the universe,
the initial element to coalesce was simple hydrogen (one proton
being circled by one electron). These hydrogen atoms were
attracted to one another and as their masses grew greater and
greater the first stars had their fusion furnaces spark into
existence where they began fusing Hydrogen into Helium (two
protons and two electrons). As these stars ran out of Hydrogen
fuel some of them then began fusing Helium into still larger
atoms and so on until some of these stars reached critical
limits leading to their explosive destruction as Novas or
Supernovas. Over billions of years every element in our bodies
has at one point been forged in the very heart of a star, so we
are indeed “star stuff.” It is even likely that many of these
elements have at one time or another been the constituents of
multiple stars over the eons.
These are what we think are essentially the facts whereby
we came to be here, but it is true that we really don’t know
why. In fact, if we think the “Big Bang” idea is right, we are
not even close to understanding why it is correct. This is
because the bang itself violates causality (i.e., the scientific
principle of cause and effect).
The scientific idea of causality basically says that
everything that happens in the universe has a cause. When an
apple falls to the ground it is the pull of gravity that causes
the fall. When a star explodes it is the nuclear reaction
reaching a critical point where the gravitational forces can no
longer hold it together that allows the fusion reaction to cause
an explosion. So, essentially, we are here be”cause” in the
ancient past a lot of stars exploded. However, the very
existence of the universe violates the idea of causality right
at step number one. That is, from a scientific perspective, the
Big Bang had no cause. This is why science only deals with the
tiny fraction of a second immediately after the start of the Big
Bang. They simply can’t deal with its cause.
So, interestingly enough, the most profound effect, the
coming into existence of the universe, has to be accepted as a
matter of “faith” since it has no cause. However, many of the
same scientists that have no problem with accepting the uncaused
existence of the universe choke on the idea of something else
that is accepted by faith as uncaused (the existence of a
supreme creator). So ultimately science is just a form of
religious belief where the fundamental articles of faith are
simply different from many other religions.
If we believe the universe to be just some accidental
uncaused explosion into existence we are left with some
interesting characteristics of the universe that should be
considered. For example, the total content of the universe is a
rather amazing balance for an accident. If the mass of the
universe was slightly higher or energy slightly lower, the
explosive creation of the universe would have collapsed shortly
after its creation. There simply would have been no time for
the very processes that have lead to our being here. On the
other hand if the mass had been slightly lower or energy
slightly higher the universe would have expanded so quickly that
the larger atoms would have never amounted to more than a thin
dust that never coalesced into anything leading to life and the
universe would be virtually empty.
Now, the rate of expansion or contraction is obviously
rather important to our being here. However, there are
extremely minor facts of nature without which we wouldn’t be
here. In addition to that, there are extremely important
exceptions without which we wouldn’t be here.
It is commonly known that as things get hotter they expand
and as things get colder they contract. In fact, most liquids
as well as solids have a quite simple behavior when they are
cooled; they shrink. This is because as it is cooled a liquid
typically contracts because the molecules are moving slower and
they are less able to overcome the attractive intermolecular
forces drawing them closer to each other. We also realize that
as liquids freeze, most of them get smaller because the
crystalline molecular structures are more compact than the
liquid molecular structures. However, without one very
important exception to this, the earth would be a very different
and hostile place.
We’ve all had experience with the one very important liquid
that is an exception. When liquid water is cooled, it contracts
like one would expect until a temperature of approximately 4
degrees Celsius is reached. After that, it expands slightly
until it reaches the freezing point, and then when it freezes it
expands by approximately 9%. If not for this exceptional
behavior, life as we know it would not exist here on earth.
Ice cubes float in a glass of water and icebergs float on
the seas simply because of expansion of water as it freezes.
This is because frozen water is slightly less dense than liquid
water and will therefore float on the liquid. If not for this
effect the earth would be one giant ice ball.
If ice contracted as it froze, then as ice formed on the
high seas the ice would sink and remain frozen. Then the
surface water would in turn freeze and sink followed by more
water freezing and building layer upon layer of ice from the
bottom of the seas up until all seas and all water everywhere
was trapped as ice. The overall atmosphere of the earth would
grow colder and colder as the seas became colder and colder
filling with more and more ice. The earth would eventually be
one giant ball of ice and life as we know it would simply not
exist. So it is that one small exception where water expands as
it freezes has made life as we know it possible. But why?
Sir Arthur C. Clarke, the famous science fiction writer
well known for “2001 a Space Odessy” and inventor of the concept
of communication satellites back in 1945, explored the concept
of “why” as part of his “Rama” series of books. At the end of
the series Sir Arthur speculated that God has made many
universes with slight differences while trying to achieve just
the right mix. What is God looking for? God is trying to
develop a universe where sentient life spreads from one end to
the other unabated. Is this universe his success? It seems
doubtful. To quote both Captain James T. Kirk and Buzz
Lightyear, sometimes there just seems to be “no sign of
intelligent life anywhere.”
