"Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation;

and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand"

This apologist, bewildered as to how to reply to my challenge, took my statements to a group of like-minded apologists in an e-mail discussion group, in order to call out the reserves, so to speak, hoping to find a suitable counter to my challenge. Little did the first apologist know that I, Anton Thorn, was also a member on board the other discussion group's distribution list. Recognizing what was going on and seeing that my own words had now been introduced to a group of Christian apologists with whom I had never debated personally, I paid extra close attention to the continuing e-mail dialogue. To my surprise, only two apologists responded to the questions regarding my statements, offering their critiques. This was one of the first times that the Argument from Existence, as I have conceived it, was to be reviewed by two leading presuppositionalist apologists.

What I read from these two apologists was absolutely astonishing!

Below I have presented the background and the details of this exchange with my review and accompanying commentary, exposing the faulty reasoning along the way.

Read on, and watch the philosophical drama unfold…

Since January, 1998, I have been participating in an e-mail discussion group on America Online. Most members of this discussion group, simply titled Religion??, have been and continue to be members of America Online, but "outsiders" are certainly welcome to join. The subject of our forum is, of course, religion, god-belief and review of apologetic arguments defending religious claims. The focus of our discussion has been quite unregulated and is open to virtually any subject of relevant interest that a participant might choose to introduce. Our only real guideline dealt with the number of posts we could submit; we all agreed that the maximum volume of output from any single participant should be limited to three submissions per day. Other than that, both theists and non-theists interested in debating their claims and associated arguments were encouraged to join and discuss whatever matters they felt pertinent to make their point.

That is, of course, until a fraudulent element enters the membership and reduces the discussion to a mockery of debate. This has happened twice in our humble little forum, averaging between 30 to 40 members at a time, many of whom choose to participate only on an infrequent basis.

Beginning in early April, 1998, an individual, arguing for Christian theism, joined our discussion and immediately made a big impression on us all. There were two dynamics to this impression which struck me from the beginning. First and foremost was the unsurpassed presumptuousness of this individual. This individual attempted to craft his arguments as if he knew our positions on all matters and as if he could anticipate our responses. Obviously, this tactic was naïvely transparent and readily noticeable, but it was so extreme that it was the first thing to strike me about this individual. The other dynamic that struck me was the degree to which his arguments had adapted classic Kantian devices and gimmickry. These devices and gimmickry already have a ready antidote, thanks to Ayn Rand. It was at this point that I realized I was going to have to bring out the heavy artillery of Objectivist philosophy.

Our exchanges continued through the space of about four months. In that course, this immoderately presumptuous individual, screen-named HOWARD8984, had invited a few of his 'friends' to join him in the 'war against the world' that he was waging in our little e-mail debate forum. Regardless of their number, the 'presuppositionalists' - as they called themselves - could neither demonstrate the veracity of their claims, nor refute the Argument from Existence, which I was developing at this time using basic Objectivist metaphysical principles.

In his frustration and recognition of the futility of his efforts, HOWARD8984 now changed his strategy entirely: instead of pointed responses and attempts to refute specific arguments that were offered, he determined that a more voluminous onslaught was the solution to refuting the world. Suddenly, new members were joining the ranks of the discussion list, each submitting posts strikingly similar to those that HOWARD8984 had been submitting. At first, no one suspected what was really going on. It had appeared that HOWARD8984 had just invited some like-minded individuals to join him in his "battle" to defend his particular brand of Christianity.

However, the charade did not last long. Suspicions grew with each new post submitted by HOWARD8984 and his freshly joined cronies, Kuyper1 and Patchill (all AOL screen names). It wasn't long until most of us realized that the similarities were too striking to be mere coincidences. With ample evidence continuing to pile up, we all concluded that these new members were actually HOWARD8984 hiding behind new screen names to conceal his identity from us.

Motive for this fraud had already established itself. Throughout June, 1998, HOWARD8984 had been rebuked a number of times for violating the only rule of the discussion forum: the three-posts-per-day limit. HOWARD8984, determined to spread his views at any cost, began to barrage the list members with numerous lengthy posts on a daily basis, regularly exceeding the three-posts-per-day maximum. These were not one-time breaches; this violation had become routine, in spite of protests from various list members concerned about volume getting out of hand.

Thus, HOWARD8984 continued to submit well more than three posts per day, under various screen names. When he was questioned on it, he denied the fact that he was doing this. When he was presented with evidence supporting our suspicions, he again dismissed it out of hand, offering now counter-evidence on his behalf. Eventually, and not without a stubborn show of resistance, HOWARD8984 was requested to depart our discussion list. Since he demonstrated that he could not restrain himself enough to follow our one guideline, and since he flagrantly denied the fact that he had intentionally disguised himself in order to get around our little rule, our list-master was more than justified in excusing HOWARD8984 from attending our debates. I don't suppose he's shared any of this with his Van Til friends.

That was late July, 1998. Possibly early August. Nonetheless, we all figured we were over and done with the "unholy trinity", as we had come to think of him.

But we were wrong. By late January, 1999, a new member was welcomed aboard our e-mail forum. This individual's screen name was Rushing7 (again, AOL). This individual's arguments, style and presumptuousness were remarkably familiar. This suspiciously familiar signature was confirmed when Rushing7 was caught plagiarizing material lifted off websites that some of us had visited - a habit that HOWARD8984 often practiced. Rushing7 was no doubt hoping no one had been to the websites he was lifting from, but a few of us had. Rushing7 had posted several fully developed arguments supporting - or, more likely, defining - his position, casually signing his own screen name to them, entire pages of which were found on internet websites. At no point did Rushing7 identify the source of these articles, even though it was established they did not belong to his hand.

Another fact that HOWARD8984/Rushing7 was not aware of was that I had enrolled myself onto a Van Til Christian apologetics discussion list, of which HOWARD8984 was also an active participant. Amazingly enough, during the period of Rushing7's career stint in our unassociated Religion?? forum, HOWARD8984 began submitting posts to the Van Til discussion list that were too similar in content to dismiss as coincidental. In several posts to the Van Til list, the arguments that HOWARD8984 claimed he had encountered with "non-believers" were virtually identical in both content and wording to several that had been initiated in the Religion?? forum.

The suspicion that HOWARD8984 had disguised himself again and fraudulently passed himself off as someone else in order to rejoin the Religion?? forum was now sealed.

The climax of this spectacle came when HOWARD8984 decided to take my challenge to TAG, based on Objectivist principles, to the folx in the Van Til discussion group.

This is where the Byron-Choi Dilemma begins…

As my involvement in the Religion?? forum became more concentrated on honing my particular arguments against god-belief in general, and against Christianity as a philosophical system in particular, I familiarized myself as thoroughly as I could with the debating tools of certain prominent apologists. Learning the apologists' arguments and the mindset that accompanies acceptance of the conclusions proposed by those arguments can be a very involved task, given the contorted sophistication that has infected academic Christian apologetics. Nonetheless, I enjoyed this challenge and recognized that I already had the proper antidote in hand for the malignant plague of god-belief: the principles of Objectivist philosophy.

With the reappearance of a presuppositionalist Christian apologist in our debate forum, I found the opportunity to engage the presuppositionalist arguments with the benefit of more familiarity, as I had researched it in the meantime.

As debates over TAG got under way, one non-theist offered the following to explain why TAG fails (note the suspicion that Rushing7 and HOWARD8984 are one and the same):

While presuppositionalists have prepared themselves for this line of counter (primarily through Kant-style attacks on sense-perception and accusations of circularity), Rushing7 offered the following as part of his retort:

The term which Rushing7 introduces here, "TANG", refers to the Transcendental Argument for the Non-existence of God, argued by philosopher Dr. Michael Martin. Click here for Michael Martin on presuppositionalism, where this argument can be found.

It was at this point, specifically this second sentence that Rushing7 offered, that I decided to jump in. The following letter was my response.

Below I present the entirety of my post, dated March 17, 1999. You will note in this post the quote from Rushing7's (a.k.a. HOWARD8984) post from earlier that same day, as well as my response to it. Although this post does not offer the Argument from Existence in its fully developed form, my primary point (starting with my third paragraph, "Besides, Rushing7,…") eloquently phrased the insurmountable challenge to TAG that baffled HOWARD8984 enough to send him running back to his religious field marshals in his hunt for possible rebuttals.

[snip]_____________________________________

Below I have copied HOWARD8984's post to the Van Til discussion group. In this post, HOWARD8984 copies some of the points from my above e-mail and asks for other presuppositionalist apologists to comment.

1. The sender: It is one HOWARD8984; the recipient of my original challenge was Rushing7. The two are the same.
2. The date: March 18, 1999;
3. The first statement: HOWARD8984 says he "was given this response from an unbeliever in a date not too long ago." He only received my post (above) into his mailbox just 15 hours before;
4. HOWARD8984 selectively excerpts only a portion from my original post. He excludes:

1. His own argument that TAG can only be shown to be false by successfully showing TANG to be true;
2. My response to this argument, pointing out that both TAG and TANG may be false;
3. My challenge to HOWARD8984 to introduce his contentions with Martin's TANG argument;
4. My personal address opening my third paragraph, identifying Rushing7 as the author I was responding to;
5. The note at the bottom of my post defining my use of the term "subjectivism".

[snip]_____________________________________

[unsnip]

Can it be true that the only two responses that apologists of the same cloak offer in response to my above challenge would actually disagree with each other?

It certainly is true.

Can it also be true that these two disagreeing responses actually confirm the relevance as well as the truth of the Argument from Existence?

It is certainly true.

Again, that is the beauty of Objectivist principles: they cut to the heart of an issue like no other philosophical method. Without the ability to reduce philosophical issues to their fundamental essentials, which Objectivism alone achieves, opposing positions are found completely indefensible.

Click on Sean Choi's Response below to see how the relevance of the Argument from Existence is substantiated by an apologist who does not contest the notion that existence finds its source in a form of consciousness.

Then, click on David Byron's Response to see what happens when an apologist recognizes the stolen concept in accepting the notion his fellow apologist Choi accepts without question, yet mistakes who is actually committing the fallacy in question.

The Byron-Choi Dilemma: