The True Origins of Us
Within bizarre and violent cosmic processes, magic is created.
If we take a look around us at all the things that make up the world, we see that our planet is brimming with a multitude of forms, patterns, and colours. There are the inanimate rocks, soils, water, and atmospheric gases that make up Earth or are attached to it. A huge biomass also clings to the surface — lifeforms ranging from one-celled microbes to complex plants and large, intricate animals. And we see the formidable range of creations and technology made by humans. Where do the basic building blocks come from that make up all this stuff?
These fundamental units are the timeless atoms. They don’t come into being when an object is created, whether that was an insect two days ago or a rock two billion years ago — they were instead produced far back in the forgotten, deep reaches of time. Once created, they are merely transferred around between molecules, matter, and living things, as these substances and objects arise and decline throughout the ages. Less than one hundred types of atoms occur naturally, but their combinations and arrangements give rise to the endless variety and properties of the things that we see.
While the Big Bang made 98% of the matter we see in the universe today, these primordial elements are only the smallest kinds of atoms…
