The religious man replies: "Yes, you are right--none of those things are real. There's no empirical support for them whatsoever. But to ridicule me on those grounds is to miss the point--like ridiculing someone on an exercise bike because, for all their effort, they are traveling nowhere. Like the exercise bicyclist, my intent with spirit worship is not to affect a change in the world but to affect a change in myself with respect to the world. The bicyclist's movement is not 'real', but his muscles are strengthened all the same; my spirits are not 'real' but my being is grounded and revealed to me all the same."
The empiricist nods. "Fair enough. But remember well this distinction you make as you carry on your business in the empirical world. Just as a person on an exercise bike should not yell at people to get out of his path, neither can you impose on others in a way that presupposes the realness of your spirits."
"Of course," says the religious man.
***
The above dialog takes place on the empiricist's "home court", so to speak--the religious man admits his deities are not real, but given the context I think it's clear that by "real" he means empirically real--i.e., it can be observed with the senses in the material world. So I don't think he's really yielding any ground to the empiricist, and yet is able to carve out a philosophically defensible position that must appear to the empiricist for all the world like a mysterious and impenetrable walled city that shuns outsiders and keeps to itself.
