Mommy, Daddy, where does mass come from?

The Higgs field gives mass to elementary particles, but most of our mass comes from somewhere else. The story of particle mass starts right after the big bang. During the very first moments of the universe, almost all particles were massless, traveling at the speed of light in a very hot "primordial soup." At some point during this period, the Higgs field turned on, permeating the universe and giving mass to the elementary particles. The Higgs field changed the environment when it was turned on,...