Imagine you had a force field generation machine, that could produce fields in any size, shape, density, etc.
If you made a force field in a tubular shape about 8 inches long, with a smooth rubber tactile force, that was squishable, but still somewhat firm, .. would it be a banana? If you moved that force field close to your mouth would it provide sustenance (whatever that means)?
Of course you would be touching a real thing. What else could you touch?
However, on closer inspection (such as taking a bite) you would be able to tell that it wasn't a banana: the theory that the object is a banana is falsifiable. If, on the other hand, the machine can produce a simulated banana that is indistinguishable from a real one in all respects, then we can say that the object _is_ a banana.
Your point can be generalized to Descartes' evil demon, or the simulation argument. Imagine a machine that can provide arbitrary sensory inputs to the brain by simulating your body as well as the universe it inhabits.
The simulator has complete control over all reality, so that all perceptions are illusions; there is no "physical" reality, only a simulated one.
To me, this is a reduction to absurdity. If a simulated universe is indistinguishable from a real one, then we (as inhabitants of the simulated universe) should say that it is a real universe, as the simulation theory is unfalsifiable.
(If we discovered that we are in fact living inside a simulation because the simulation code was buggy and we hacked it from inside, then a Simuluation Argument Believer could just say that the "real" universe is also just another level of the simulation. This is why the _metaphysical_ Simulation Argument is unfalsifiable.)
Similarly, if a machine can produce a perfect copy of a real banana, then the copy is also actually a banana. And if a banana feels solid, then it actually is a solid object, and we aren't touching "nothing". It is irrelevant whether the feeling is produced by electromagnetic forces, or some special Platonic "solid" surface that doesn't actually exist.
If you made a force field in a tubular shape about 8 inches long, with a smooth rubber tactile force, that was squishable, but still somewhat firm, .. would it be a banana? If you moved that force field close to your mouth would it provide sustenance (whatever that means)?
Would you be touching a real thing?