Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. It is the lightest element, consisting of one proton encircled by one electron. About 91% of the atoms in the universe are hydrogen. Helium is the next most abundant. It is the second-lightest element, consisting of two protons and two neutrons in the nucleus, encircled by two electrons. Helium constitutes just under 9% of the atoms in the universe. All the remaining elements combined constitute less than 1%. Astronomers refer to these heavier elements as metals. In astronomy, a metal is any element with an atomic number higher than 2. Note that this is different from the definition used by chemists. In astronomy metals include elements like oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon. Metals pose a serious challenge for advocates of the big bang and secular models of galaxy evolution. But they are a feature and natural expectation of biblical creation.
An Unusual Environment
Our experiences on Earth are not typical of the universe. We are made of the rare stuff. Our bodies and environment contain a great deal of carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and other metals that are only trace elements for most of the universe. Earth has hydrogen as well, but most of it is bound to heavier elements, forming compounds such as water. These heavier elements and compounds are essential for life as we understand it. So it makes sense from a creation perspective that Earth would contain a large abundance of metals. However, atomic abundances on Earth are not typical of the universe beyond.
The sun, on the other hand, is far more representative of the rest of the universe. About 91% of the atoms in the sun are hydrogen, and just under 9% are helium. The sun does have heavier elements like oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, and iron. But these constitute less than 1%. We know this from the science of spectroscopy. Often, ratios of elements are expressed by mass fraction rather than number of atoms. The sun is about 73% hydrogen by mass, and 25% helium. The difference in ratios is because helium is four times as massive as hydrogen. So even though only 1 atom in 10 is helium, it counts four times as much in terms of mass contribution. The metals then constitute about 2% of the sun’s mass.
Amazingly, this is true for basically every star we have ever examined. That is, stars are always about 73%-75% hydrogen and 25% helium by mass, with trace amounts of metals. It is also true of nebulae. And it is true of gas giant planets like Jupiter and Saturn. There are slight variations in the ratios, but hydrogen and helium are always dominant.
The ratio of metals to hydrogen in a star or nebula is called metallicity. Quantitatively, metallicity is often estimated by the mass ratio of iron to hydrogen since iron is easy to detect spectroscopically. Iron can be used as a rough proxy for all the other metals. In other words, if a star has more iron than another star, it will also generally have more oxygen, carbon, and other metals as well.
Stellar Populations
The metallicity of a star is always small, but it varies from star to star. Astronomers have discovered that stars fall into two natural categories based on metallicity. Stars with metallicity comparable to the sun (between about 3 times solar and 10% solar) are referred to as population I (“population one” – abbreviated as “pop I”) stars because they were the first discovered. However, many stars have a metallicity less than 10% that of the sun. These are referred to as population II stars. In a spiral galaxy like the Milky Way, the spiral disk tends to have mainly pop I stars. Conversely, in the central bulge and in globular star clusters, pop II stars dominate.
But what is the origin of these metals? We know from recorded history that stars were made on the fourth day of the creation week (Genesis 1:14-19). Whether God made the stars from nothing or from material He had previously created on days one through three remains an open question. But we know that metals existed on day one because the Earth existed on day one and is made of metals. In particular, we know that the Earth was covered with water on day one (Genesis 1:1-2). And the water molecule consists of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. And oxygen is a metal. Biblically, metals preceded the creation of the first stars.
Secular Perspectives on Metallicity
Conversely, secularists reject the history recorded in Genesis. Most of them assert that the universe came into existence in a big bang some 13.8 billion years ago. They propose that the initial state of the universe was far too hot and dense for ordinary matter to exist. But, as the universe expanded, the temperature dropped to the point where atomic nuclei could be produced from the extant energy. But this leads to a potential problem. The conditions would have been right to produce only the two lightest elements: hydrogen and helium. Only trace amounts of lithium could form. None of the heavy elements could be produced in such conditions. Thus, the big bang (by itself) cannot account for the existence of metals in the universe.
However, secular astronomers have proposed a solution to this problem. They speculate that the first stars to form after the big bang would have had no metallicity since none of the heavy elements existed at the time. They further suggest that the heavier elements were produced in the cores of ultra-massive stars when those stars exploded as a supernova. We have observed that massive stars do occasionally explode. And unlike the big bang, the core of a massive star at the time of a supernova theoretically has the right conditions to produce heavier elements – metals. The idea is that some of these metals are released into space during the supernova, contaminating the interstellar medium. Thus, the next generation of stars then forms from the gas that has been contaminated with metals.
As more generations of stars occur, the interstellar medium is gradually enriched with metals when the massive stars explode. Secular astronomers believe that population I stars occur in regions of space that have experienced more generations of stars – hence higher metallicity, whereas population II stars occur in regions that have experienced fewer generations and thus have lower metallicity. The hypothetical first generation of stars with zero metallicity would be called population III.
Low-mass stars have low luminosity, meaning they use up their fuel very slowly and have a theoretical lifespan that exceeds the secular age of the universe. Thus, low-mass population III stars should still exist today. Yet, none of have been discovered despite extensive searches for them. This problem with the big bang has been known for some time. It was one of the motivations for constructing the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The JWST is capable of detecting galaxies at tremendous distances, which secularists claim is looking back to a time shortly after the big bang. Surely the farthest (and thus earliest) galaxies detected by the JWST would contain the long-sought-after pop III stars. But they do not.
James Webb Space Telescope Data
The JWST has discovered metals in all the distant galaxies it has analyzed so far. This is devastating to secular origins scenarios, but it is a prediction of the ASC model – a biblical creation model. The ASC model stipulates that we see the universe in real time regardless of distance and proposes that the Bible’s description of events is using the ASC (or visual synchrony convention), which was the universal convention until modern times. This means that, all other things being equal, distant galaxies should be comparable to nearby ones. In particular, based on the ASC model, I predicted in January 2022 that the JWST would find metals in the most distant galaxies, contrary to secular expectations. This prediction was confirmed later that year.
The latest observations from the JWST only increase problems for the big bang and secular models of galaxy evolution. Not only has the JWST failed to detect pop III stars, but it continues to find galaxies with surprisingly high metallicity – surprising, that is, from a secular perspective.[1] Some of these galaxies are at a distance that, according to secular assumptions, means we are seeing them only 350 million years after the big bang, yet they have high metallicity.[2] That is insufficient time, according to standard models, for stars to go through the evolution needed to create such an abundance of metals. But there they are. It is almost as if such galaxies were created with metals already in them. And of course, that is exactly what biblically compatible models like the ASC model expected to find.
Indeed, JWST has detected oxygen in the most distant confirmed galaxy. This galaxy “has about 10 times more heavy elements than expected.”[3] More accurately, it has 10 times higher metallicity than secular astronomers expected. However, the ASC model predicts that mature galaxies with metals will be found at all distances – to the limit of the JWST’s detection abilities. It is not at all surprising to see science confirm biblical creation time and time again. But it is always fun!
[1] https://research.astro.cornell.edu/news/astronomers-discover-metal-rich-galaxies-early-universe-0
[2] https://www.sciencealert.com/jwst-has-found-a-young-galaxy-with-a-surprising-amount-of-metals
[3] https://www.eso.org/public/news/eso2507/