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Just to clarify, I am not in favor of abortion.

You say: I am not "practicing scientism"...

Please reread the definition of scientism: a term used...to refer to belief in the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach, and the view that empirical science constitutes the most authoritative worldview or most valuable part of human learning to the exclusion of other viewpoints... the dogmatic endorsement of scientific methodology and the reduction of all knowledge to only that which is measurable.

Doesn't that characterize your approach to the subject of abortion and the beginnings of human life?

Science is a methodology concerned with characterizing the real world...

Religion is a methodology concerned with characterizing the real world. People see and feel things that cannot be explained by science or even the promise of some future science. People long to believe and to know God.

it does not deal with religious or philosophical matters.

That's a cop out. For science to have any value it must deal with religious and philosophical matters. There aren't any facts in a vacuum. Science is a part of human life and it always was. It must be accounted for and it must account for human life.

The reason I concentrate purely on the scientific matters when discussing abortion is that the moment you bring up religion, many of those who are pro-abortion automatically dismiss you as a religious freak intent on controlling women. Focusing on the science makes it impossible for pro-abortion zealots to dismiss pro-life arguments as religious beliefs that they do not share.

That is an interesting argument, but is it fruitful? How many "abortion zealots" switch over the pure science of "life" (not human life)? My personal experience is that the Spirit teaches deeply and swiftly in the soul that's ready to listen. Zealots rarely listen and even more rarely are ready to change. Real change in human thinking happens at the margins with those who are at the edge of a camp of thought, ready to move forward or away from their previously held beliefs. All human beings believe. It is a fundamental part of the human condition.

Everything I have said concerning the aliveness of sperms, ova, zygote, blastocysts, and embryos is verifiable by simple biochemical tests that can be performed by anyone. Ditto for everything I said about their being human.

So they're alive, they're human, but they are not human beings? This argument feeds the abortionist's argument (we can't really know when it is a human being - it's just a blob of living human cells) and clouds the reality. The only important question about abortion is "when does human life begin".

You are completely missing the point, which is that, scientifically (i.e. objectively), there is no distinct point at which life begins. You can make valid arguments for destroying that life, based on objectively observable characteristics, but to argue that a growing human embryo is not alive or is not human is nonsensical and unsupportable by any objective measure. If that is your basis for being pro-abortion, then your abortion advocacy is based on a lie. If you acknowledge that the embryo is always a living human, but you feel it is okay to kill it up until it crosses some developmental point, you move the abortion argument away from the science and into the realm of opinion, which is not objective.

This paragraph doesn't make sense at all. You've admitted to "killing" living human embryos as part of your experimentation. Why are you not charged with murder? Because they're not yet human beings. At what point of a pregnancy would you consider it murder to kill the developing embryo? You yourself state that at some "developmental point" you can kill it without recourse or regret. The wholly objective point at which a developing embryo becomes a human being is when it attaches to the uterine wall. That's my definition. It is objective and it is observable. Why isn't that as scientific as your ability to kill or preserve "human life" in your Petri dish?

You have noticed that I have not discussed human beings, or my opinion of what constitutes a human being. Although you are using that to try to "prove" some inconsistency in what I have said, my avoidance of that specific issue is completely intentional.

I noted this immediately. Unless you know what is or isn't a human being then how can you claim to be scientific or anti-abortion?

Your link goes to a Wikipedia entry which points out, in the very first sentence, that the word is pejorative. Of course, I recognize immediately from the suffix "ism" that it is coined for the purpose of denigrating scientists and the scientific method, and I do take offense at its use. Psychologically, it gives an interesting insight into those using that word. The use of the "ism" suffix is meant to communicate that science is a de facto religion, with the implication that religions are just superstitious beliefs with no intrinsic validity, and science is no better. What message about your attitudes toward faith do you seriously think you send when you try to denigrate science by comparing it to a religion?

Doesn't that characterize your approach to the subject of abortion and the beginnings of human life?

It's not even close. Science is not a "worldview"; it is a methodology used to try to describe the real world as objectively and accurately as possible. I don't claim human cells of any type are alive because of some arbitrary belief; I claim they are alive because I can perform biochemical tests upon them. Those tests are not subject to interpretation, and will show the same result no matter who performs them.

Religion has nothing to do with the real world. It covers the spiritual world. The topics covered by religion cannot be addressed by science. It is as ludicrous to try to substitute religion for scientific inquiry as it is to try to substitute science for religious inquiry.

You may wish fervently that science would deal with religious or philosophical matters, but it can't. And the facts do exist, all by themselves. For example, hydrogen is a simple atom, which normally consists of a proton and an electron. Whether we can describe it or not, whether or not anyone even exists to try to describe it, the nature of hydrogen won't change. Some of us are born with a fervent desire to observe and describe hydrogen, but if no curious person were ever born again, hydrogen wouldn't change.

It is my observation that most abortion advocates spend a lot of time and effort convincing themselves and others that nobody really dies during an abortion. They push this scientifically nonsensical idea that, somehow, something that is utterly devoid of life suddenly becomes alive at some arbitrary point. I have not seen much evidence that religious beliefs are a factor. The most devout Catholic in the world can fervently advocate for abortion, if they are unaware that the embryo is a living human being. An atheist can be fervently pro-life if they understand the nature of the embryo. I try to educate people on the facts that there is no point during human development at which something that is not previously alive spontaneously becomes alive, and that the sperm, ovum, zygote, blastocyst, embryo, etc., are human. I do that because it is a lot more difficult to defend abortion when one understands that the object of the abortion is, in fact, alive and human. Anyone who defends abortion on the basis that the object being aborted is not alive or human is, in fact, saying that they do not think it is acceptable to destroy human life. Educating those people on the pure objective scientific facts actually does a lot to convince them to be pro-life.

No, it doesn't help the abortionist agenda at all. The abortionist is perfectly aware that they kill a human being every time they do an abortion. They rationalize their actions on non-scientific criteria--for instance by telling themselves that since "society" does not have any time or effort invested in the unborn child, the unborn child does not have the basic rights of a human being. On the other hand, most or all abortion clients convince themselves that they aren't killing anyone when they have their abortions. Educating them on the fact that there is no distinct start point of human life, and that human beings can only relay human life really does not help the abortionist's sales efforts; abortionists encourage ignorance.

You might go back and reread what I said. I have never said that I have created or killed human embryos. I said that I grow living human cells--not embryos--and have killed countless millions of them. The cells I grow come from people... a two year old boy... a 67 year old woman... etc. They do not have the capability to develop into separate, new human beings; therefore, no one is deprived of life by killing them.

I do not use arbitrary points as dividing lines before which it's okay to kill and after which it isn't; it is counterproductive. By arbitrarily deciding that implantation is the point at which the blastocyst should be considered human, you are saying that such a thing is a matter of opinion and, as such, cannot be objectively verified. If you choose the arbitrary point of implantation, and someone else chooses the arbitrary point of first movement felt by the mother, and someone else chooses the arbitrary point at which the expelled fetus first draws air into its lungs, and no one is using any objective scientific measure of human life, then you can keep arguing opinion all day without anyone's position ever changing. That practice of considering someone human at some arbitrary point opens up a can of worms that I'd rather just keep closed.

I noted this immediately. Unless you know what is or isn't a human being then how can you claim to be scientific or anti-abortion?

As I've already said multiple times, I consider a human organism with the ability to grow into a functional human being deserving of protection. This means that the countless millions of living human cells that I have grown and killed did not deserve any kind of protection; they simply did not have the capacity to grow into autonomous human beings. Whether or not a human organism has the capacity to become an autonomous human being actually *is* something that can be determined objectively and scientifically.