Regarding Maine Voices column by Keith Moore, Ph.D., pastor of the First Baptist Church of Portland (“Unborn children need legal protection” June 4):

Moore is unclear about whether he is discussing “human life” or “a human being.” The distinction is critical to his position about what science says about what is present at the moment of conception. By “human being,” I’m assuming that Moore is referring to a “consciousness” or “soul,” not “the human genome” that defines the genes that make up the homo sapiens creature.

If Moore is discussing “human life,” then science has a role in determining whether that life is present at conception. The cells that result from conception may be tested for properties that meet our current definition of living cells containing the human genome, or “human life,” and they will pass that test. Science can therefore definitively conclude that there is “human life” at conception.

If Moore is discussing “a human being” or a “consciousness” or a “soul,” then science has no role in determining whether one is present. There is no scientific test that can definitively identify human “consciousness” associated with cells that result from conception. Science does not have a working definition for “human consciousness” or “soul.”

A human consciousness may exist at conception, or may not; we will never know. It is certainly valid for anyone to believe that a human “consciousness” exists at conception. But that would be a statement of faith, not of science.

Bob McKillop
Portland

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