Theists, are you immune to being decieved?

[The Reality Salesman01]

MindForgedManacle is completely right; your objection can be raised against anyone’s view of reality. It’s taken several forms in the history of philosophy such as Descartes' Demon and the Brain in the Vat. You claim that you are immune to such an objection because you are willing to alter your beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. What about your belief that your senses accurately perceive reality? Or your belief that the exterior Universe is knowable? If you were delusional or being deceived then you cannot demonstrate that these two claims are indeed true without invoking circularity (these two beliefs do make more sense in light of theism however). It is an interesting subject to ponder, but as far as the debate on theism it is irrelevant.

I am willing to revise anything that I hold as true, if the evidence can show otherwise. We are not talking about debating the reliability of our senses. We are not talking about whether or not I, personally, can trust that when I am looking at a rock, it is in fact a rock (well, a little we are).

I can certainly understand why you would want to take the conversation in that direction, because if you feel that you've undermined reality and all objectivity, then suddenly there is no conversation worth having. If a belief in God requires rejecting every human faculty of experience as a means of its defense, then by all means, carry on. But I will not participate.

I'm willing to bet that's not what you aim to do. I think we can both agree on a few things that would be necessary to have a conversation like this.

I think you will concede that we both can see, touch, and hear things. Some of the things we feel can be verified, while others cannot.

I think you are able to recognize the difference between Objectivity and Subjectivity, and I'm willing to bet that you recognize the relevance that such words would have in a conversation of this sort.

I think you will concede that there are things in the exterior universe, some of which are knowable, while others are not.

Are we going to be able to have a conversation about something real, or is it going to be derailed by a devil's advocate defending a sort of Pyrrhonism in order to avoid an honest exchange of ideas? I personally think that would be a waste of time, and I would really not like to have a conversation intended for students during their first week of philosophy. Can we skip the brain in a vat, and find common ground, or do we continue under the pretense that nothing can really be known and conversations are useless?

I'll leave it up to you.

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In short,

We are talking about beliefs that are either accurate depictions of reality, or they are not.

This conversation is contingent upon us already establishing that we share the same faculties for discerning such things, and in fact, such faculties are required to do so to discern anything at all. Let's not waste time by starting where Descartes began. What would be the point of reading philosophy if every time we wanted to have a philosophical conversation we had to start from the very beginning?

Can you recognize a standard by which we determine reality from fantasy? Or am I a pumpkin if it seems real to me that I am a pumpkin?

If I am not a pumpkin, how is it that we establish that I am not without some standard by which people are determined as people, and pumpkins are determined as pumpkins (senses, objectivity, verification, and so forth)?

If in the event that I am presented evidence that I am not a pumpkin, and I ignore this evidence in favor of the belief that I am, by your previously defended rationale, it would seem that I had as much right to call YOU delusional for saying otherwise. If not, why?