Responding To Horrible Arguments

All of us use bad arguments at times. Nobody will be right about everything all of the time. But some arguments are especially bad. You look at the argument again. And again. And again. It still doesn't make any sense. You keep trying to untangle it to get at the reasoning behind it. Is the argument really as awful as it seems? But why would somebody use such a bad argument? Surely he didn't mean that. But what's the alternative?

There's nothing new under the sun. Anybody who's been involved in apologetics for long should resonate with the experience Basil of Caesarea described more than 1500 years ago:

"The very obviousness of the absurdity makes it difficult for us to find arguments to confute their unreasonableness; so that really their folly looks like an advantage to them; just as soft and yielding bodies offer no resistance, and therefore cannot be struck a stout blow. It is impossible to bring a vigorous confutation to bear on a palpable absurdity. The only course open to us is to pass by their abominable impiety in silence. Yet our love for the brethren and the importunity of our opponents makes silence impossible." (On The Holy Spirit, 17:41)