[Someday]

Reality is what exists independent on what we think or feel about it.

To me it's all an ontological question really.

The reason I brought up the Pre-Socratic philosophers is because they were essentially the forerunners of materialists, but they were looking for a different kind of explanation from science. Science tries to figure out the efficient causes of what happens in the world. That's why it looks for laws of nature and tests them by their capacity to predict and control what can be observed. But the Pre-Socratics were looking for the substances that explain everything in the world, including not only what happens in the world, but also what exists there. For example, they wanted to know not only how things change, but how there could be change at all. Instead of merely inferring to the best efficient-cause explanation of what happens in the world, the Pre-Socratics were trying to figure out the best ontological explanation of what exists (as well as what happens) in the world.

Blessings