The knowledge that the atoms that comprise life on earth - the atoms that make up the human body, are traceable to the crucibles that cooked light elements into heavy elements in their core under extreme temperatures and pressures. These stars- the high mass ones among them- went unstable in their later years- they collapsed and then exploded- scattering their enriched guts across the galaxy- guts made of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and all the fundamental ingredients of life itself. These ingredients become part of gas clouds that condense, collapse, form the next generation of solar systems- stars with orbiting planets. And those planets now have the ingredients for life itself. So that when I look up at the night sky, and I know that yes we are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts is that the universe is in us. When I reflect on that fact, I look up- many people feel small, cause their small and the universe is big. But I feel big because my atoms came from those stars. . Neil Degrasse Tyson
About This Quote

If you find yourself feeling small, think about how big the universe is. If you are thinking small, you are very likely living in a human body. If you are thinking small, you are made up of the same atoms that the dinosaurs lived in. The Earth’s atmosphere consists of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, and 1% argon.

All of these chemicals were created in the cores of stars. The enormous expanses of space that exist in our universe were formed by explosions that occurred billions of years ago.

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