No, elements are not considered proper nouns. Proper nouns are specific names of people, places, organizations, or sometimes things, and they are always capitalized. For instance, ‘Paris’ is a proper noun because it refers to a specific city.
Elements, on the other hand, such as hydrogen, oxygen, and gold, are classified as common nouns. They represent categories of substances rather than specific entities. While the names of elements are typically capitalized in chemical formulas and when they appear in the periodic table, this capitalization is not the same as the proper noun usage.
To summarize, elements are common nouns used to describe general types of materials, and they do not fit the criteria for being proper nouns.