system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Did the atoms that make up my living body exist as atoms of a stone/tree/animals etc before I became me?

I hope this is the correct "science" sub-reddit to post this question which has been bothering me for a while. I don't think this is a metaphysical question as I am talking about physical attributes (if you can consider an atomic particle physical).

Obviously we are "dead" for a long time before we are born into this life (at least our physical bodies do not exist until we are incarnated). If all matter has existed since the big bang, does that mean the atoms that make up my living body right now have over the billions of years since the big bang, been atoms in rocks, trees, earth, animals etc and when I die the atoms will once again take up a different form? So the minute component atoms that make the physical "me" me were part of something else before they were "me"? I hope that makes sense? My science teacher always said that nothing cannot become something and vice versa.
gpt
Yep, you pretty much answered your own question there. The atoms in your body had to come from somewhere after all.

It would be fun to trace out the 'memberships' of all atoms in your body, and see where they have been (as well as what they were part of) before they ended up as you. But alas, all atoms of a particular element are alike. We do know that elements heavier than helium (and a minute bit of lithium) were predominantly fused in stellar cores and supernovas. Some serious recycling right there. :)