An interesting quote on page 9 of the book Is There a Creator Who Cares About You is one that I came across when I was first waking up 5-6 years ago. I thought I mentioned it here before, but apparently not. So here it is below. I'm highlighting some key points for a critical analysis (part one is highlighted in bold and underlined; part two is bold; part three is underlined):
We invite all who have an open mind [and who might think there is no god] to consider this subject [of the possible existence of a Creator]. The book Belief in God and Intellectual Honesty notes that one who possesses “intellectual honesty” is characterized by a “readiness to scrutinize what one believes to be true” and “to pay sufficient attention to other evidence available."
In the subject at hand, such “evidence available” can help us to see whether there is a Creator behind life and the universe.
I added words to the first highlighted part by placing them inside the brackets. The context (preceding paragraphs) seems to suggest this is the full intent of the sentence. Review for yourself to verify if you'd like. This is also consistent with the general pattern in Watchtower literature of only advocating an open-mind and scrutinizing one's own beliefs, if and only if, such beliefs run contrary to what the Watchtower teaches. To the Watchtower it's never okay to scrutinize Watchtower beliefs or be open minded that such might be erroneous.
As to the second part, this is ironically an intellectually dishonest quotation of Belief in God and Intellectual Honesty. While I don't have a copy of this book, I can find part of the context of these quotes on books.google.com, On page 6:
and page 21:
First it's worth noting that the Watchtower appears to pull two sentence fragments from locations some 15 pages apart and sandwich them together in reverse order (bold highlight above). Anyway, look at the page 6 quote. The source is making a formal definition of intellectual honesty that consists of at least two parts. The Watchtower's partial quote only deals with the first point, and only does so by leaving out 2/3 of the sentence! They miss the part about taking "into consideration all the evidence available [for a belief]." That omission isn't too big a deal, as the Watchtower authors always scramble try to find any shred of perceived evidence to support their argument. Perhaps that part was such a 'given' to them that it went without saying. However, they leave off a very important ending portion of the quoted sentence fragment. After quoting "a readiness to pay sufficient attention to other evidence available", what's left off is how that evidence "might weaken or undermine the plausibility or acceptability of that belief." Leaving this off weakens the impact of what it means to look at other evidence.
This is significant, because the Creator book's next sentence (the third highlighted part above) says: "such 'evidence available' can help us to see whether [or not] there is a Creator behind life and the universe." My insertion of "[or not]" is implied and would be a stronger implication had they quoted the full sentence above. So if we are to adhere to intellectual honesty that means we should seek out information that might give us sound reason to reject a belief -- we should be as objective in our information search as possible. Why is this part left out? Why was the quote watered down? One can wonder if it was intentional. If that is the case then the same book that the Watchtower quotes from says this about the contrast between dishonesty and honesty (also page 6):
Back to the first page 6 quote, it would be interesting to see what the second criteria defining intellectual dishonesty is about -- it hints by saying "a willingness to reveal" ...what? For some reason I thought I found the rest of that sentence in the past, but can't anymore. My fuzzy memory recalls it saying something like, "a willingness to reveal to others any counter-evidence you discover that goes against your beliefs." Although, it's possible I'm remembering incorrectly.