What is wrong with the following explanation of an experiment? When it was heated, the sample of carbon decomposed.

"Carbon" is an element. It is found in the fourth group of the periodic table, and it is a stable element. This means that it can not be decomposed via heating, because if an element were to break down, it would release its subatomic particles. The explanation was probably one used to describe the thermal decomposition of a compound into smaller compounds.