Do we all breath dead people?

[ModernArtist25]

so if 65% of the human body is made of oxygen (according to wiki), does this mean that if humans die, oxygen is dispersed in the air and we all breath dead people?

[swansont]

so if 65% of the human body is made of oxygen (according to wiki), does this mean that if humans die, oxygen is dispersed in the air and we all breath dead people?

 

Oxygen will get bound up in other compounds, but yes. Some of the air you breathe was part of a corpse, some was breathed by dead people, and water you drink is recycled dinosaur pee.

[StringJunky]

so if 65% of the human body is made of oxygen (according to wiki), does this mean that if humans die, oxygen is dispersed in the air and we all breath dead people?

Worse than that: the soil that you get your food from is made from countless dead bodies. Life feeds on death to live.

[Delta1212]

Every part of you body used to be part of something dead, human or otherwise.

 

On the molecular level, you're a Frankenstein's monster of recycled parts.

[iNow]

We are stardust.

 

It's beautiful the way the universe (aka all of us and all things) recycles itself.

 

An author (Eckert Tolle?) wrote: "We are the universe expressing itself as a human being for a while." I tend to agree.

[ModernArtist25]

Can elements like oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, etc. that make up the human body can be seen?

[iNow]

Yes, we can: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/this-microscope-can-see-down-to-individual-atoms

[ModernArtist25]

Ooh i see, but only with a super microscope lol

[iNow]

Well, technically speaking, you see those elements any time you look at any thing.

 

Your question regarding if we can see them could easily be answered by saying those elements are ALL we see (though that's more poetic than pedantic).

 

It's only if you wish to look at single atoms that you need specially equipment.

[ModernArtist25]

Well i sure cant see oxygen though what we breath, it is colorless

Do you mean we "see" them because we know that they exist? For example, if I believe in demons and angels, I will "see" them too...

[CharonY]

You can't see them with your eyes, obviously. But there are many instruments which allow you to measure it. What iNow mentions is that we are able to see the macrostructures containing the elements.

[iNow]

^ correct

[Fuzzwood]

You can also condense the gases into liquids. You can easily see those.

[jimmydasaint]

We are stardust.

 

It's beautiful the way the universe (aka all of us and all things) recycles itself.

 

An author (Eckert Tolle?) wrote: "We are the universe expressing itself as a human being for a while." I tend to agree.

Pretty spiritual stuff here iNow. That is a nice quote from the author. Believe it or not, this was the thing that absolutely hooked me into biology as a teenager. It was the recycling of all matter throughout the biosphere. It was stunning and awesome.

 

 

On a general note, are there estimates of how many atoms we have that are recycled from humans of old, or about how quickly the body recycles its cells? I seem to remember a figure of 7 years to recycle all body cells (except for brain cells?)?

[dimreepr]

On a general note, are there estimates of how many atoms we have that are recycled from humans of old, or about how quickly the body recycles its cells? I seem to remember a figure of 7 years to recycle all body cells (except for brain cells?)?

 

 

It's far quicker than that...

 

https://www.quora.com/How-long-does-it-take-for-most-of-the-atoms-in-your-body-to-be-replaced-by-others

 

 

In about a year every atom in your body would have been exchanged. Not a single atom in your body resides there forever and there is a 100% chance that 1000s of other humans through history held some of the same atoms that you currently hold in your body.

[Phi for All]

Well i sure cant see oxygen though what we breath, it is colorless

Do you mean we "see" them because we know that they exist? For example, if I believe in demons and angels, I will "see" them too...

 

Have you ever seen an air cannon blow a smoke ring? Study the physics of a toroidal vortex to "see" how oxygen and nitrogen react as a fluid.

[jimmydasaint]

Pretty spiritual stuff here iNow. That is a nice quote from the author. Believe it or not, this was the thing that absolutely hooked me into biology as a teenager. It was the recycling of all matter throughout the biosphere. It was stunning and awesome.

 

 

On a general note, are there estimates of how many atoms we have that are recycled from humans of old, or about how quickly the body recycles its cells? I seem to remember a figure of 7 years to recycle all body cells (except for brain cells?)?

Sorry about this but your citation referenced a person who did not write was stated. Do you have a different citation please?

 

 

 

This data was first pointed out by Dr. Paul C. Aebersold in 1953 in a landmark paper he presented to the Smithsonian Institute, “Radioisotopes - New keys to knowledge”

 

• http://www.archive.org/stream/an...

I looked up the original 1953 paper and must have missed all these facts. Aebersold only mentioned applications of radioisotopic iodine etc...

[iNow]

Pretty spiritual stuff here iNow.

Atheists are hardly immune from awe

[Sensei]

Non-existence after death is pretty good reason to feel awe.

So everybody, especially atheists the most interested, should hard work on how to live as long as possible/forever.

Otherwise it's just wasting your precious time here.

Edited August 20, 2016 by Sensei

[iNow]

On a general note, are there estimates of how many atoms we have that are recycled from humans of old, or about how quickly the body recycles its cells?

Essentially all of the atoms in our body are recycled, but how many times those atoms were in another human in years past depends on lots of factors:

 

http://gawker.com/5987071/are-there-atoms-of-abraham-lincoln-in-my-body-right-now

 

As for how often cells in the body are replaced, that depends, too. This time, on the type of cell / where in the body we happen to be looking:

 

http://www.livescience.com/33179-does-human-body-replace-cells-seven-years.html

[Sensei]

Well i sure cant see oxygen though what we breath, it is colorless

We can see it, in some circumstances.

Air from breath has temperature of body or so.

But if environment has significantly lower temperature, we can see something like this:

http://media.gettyimages.com/videos/caribou-with-visible-breath-in-cold-weather-looking-around-on-rocks-video-id290-13

Google for

"Frosty breath effect","Cold breath effect".

 

 

After ionization normally colorless gases have different colors (spectral lines)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Gase-in-Entladungsroehren.jpg

Edited August 20, 2016 by Sensei

[StringJunky]

So everybody, especially atheists the most interested, should hard work on how to live as long as possible/forever.

Otherwise it's just wasting your precious time here.

What you gonna do with forever? Any idea how long that is?

Essentially all of the atoms in our body are recycled, but how many times those atoms were in another human in years past depends on lots of factors:

 

http://gawker.com/5987071/are-there-atoms-of-abraham-lincoln-in-my-body-right-now

 

As for how often cells in the body are replaced, that depends, too. This time, on the type of cell / where in the body we happen to be looking:

 

http://www.livescience.com/33179-does-human-body-replace-cells-seven-years.html

Except the brain... or some parts of it anyway.

Edited August 20, 2016 by StringJunky

[iNow]

The brain too is made of atoms and their constituent parts, and those parts all came from somewhere else

[StringJunky]

The brain too is made of atoms and their constituent parts, and those parts all came from somewhere else

Sorry. I read it wrong.

Edited August 20, 2016 by StringJunky

[iNow]

No apology needed. There is something devastatingly beautiful about this topic, though. Parts of the first dinosaur, the first fish, the first plant, the first organism, organelle, and even orangutan...making me me and you you... right now. There's probably also bits of Hitlers poop and other unsavory things, but I prefer to focus on the former and that makes me smile