Reality, or Simple Perceptions

As I continue to read "Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar," by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein, I find more and more troubling philosophy topics that are very "grey." One of these topics is the concept of idealism, which is defined as, "the group of philosophies which assert that reality, or reality as we can know it, is fundamentally mental, mentally constructed, or otherwise immaterial." Created by George Berkeley, idealism relates to reality and how we perceive it. To state idealism simply, God portrays objects into our mind, and nothing actually exists. However, there are many holes to this topic.

First off, idealism contradicts with empiricism, with is the idea that we gain knowledge through our senses. Most people can agree with this because for the most part this is true. Through our knowledge we are able to make inferences. The book gives a very good example of this: you see a sheep sheared on one side. Through your observations you know that farmers do not usually shear only one side of the sheep. Therefore, you are able to infer that the other side of the sheep is also sheared. So, if nothing actually exists then how are we able to make observations through touch? Although there are many other questions that can disprove Berkeley's theory, Berkeley has an argument that can not go wrong. He says, that if you try to imagine an object, and you think about the properties of that object, you can only think perceive those properties in your head as an idea. Therefore, he states that since we have no evidence of that object besides that perceptions in our head, it does not exist. This I can agree with, however, I do not agree with the idea that God portrays these objects into our head. So what do you think about this?