It couldn't be "hidden" from us because a "nonphysical afterlife" is, by definition, imperceptible to physical perception, otherwise it would be physical enough to reflect photons and/or generate sound waves.

Fair. But maybe another word instead of hidden. They say dark matter exists despite not interacting with light, but it does interact with gravity? Can't something be hidden even if it doesn't leave obvious clues of its possible existence?

They say dark matter exists despite not interacting with light, but it does interact with gravity? — TiredThinker

True, and that's because 'dark matter' is physical.

Can't something be hidden even if it doesn't leave obvious clues of its possible existence?

If it's a physical phenomenon, then sure. I don't understand how a "nonphysical afterlife" can be physically "hidden" from direct or indirect physical observation.

But if there was a nonphysical existence that we could expect after physical death, what reasons could there be that it should be so well hidden from us that we tend to leave it to religions to speculate on it? — TiredThinker

Why would it have to be a non-physical life? Religions describe heaven as being in the presence of god and hell as being tortured by burning. How would either be possible in a non-physical form?
Maybe it is hidden in another universe!

Maybe I am presupposing that any part of us is nonphysical and therefore it interacts with this nonphysical world. I agree only physical interacts with physical and if any new things come along that interact with physical stuff than it too is defined as physical.

I am interested in logical arguments, perhaps taking big leaps, as to why any such realm if it exists would be hidden.

1). Perhaps there is a deity that hides the living from the dead so we live our lives and don't commit suicide thinking it will give us peace.

2). Maybe the physical world is the minority of things and rarely interacts with the physical world. Like all we know being little more than colors on the EM spectrum.

3). Maybe what we call nonphysical actually is physical but is so subtle that our instruments don't come close to perceiving it.

I'd be happy to hear any interpretations of why an afterlife if it exists is so well hidden. I recently had a close relative pass away and have been in a bit of an existential crisis. I appreciate any concepts on this subject.

I'd be happy to hear any interpretations of why an afterlife if it exists is so well hidden. I recently had a close relative pass away and have been in a bit of an existential crisis. I appreciate any concepts on this subject — TiredThinker

My condolences, TiredThinker.

I have speculated on a number of other threads about 'reincarnation', 'immortality', 'life extension' (e.g. immorbidity tech), 'transhumanism', etc but as a thorough-going naturalist, "spiritual after-life" (i.e. super-naturalism (e.g. ghost-without-the-machine)) makes absolutely no sense to me. That said, however, I've speculated about a 'concept of divinity – understand, I'm completely agnostic about this – wherein "eternal life", so to speak, is to live on (somehow) in the omni-memory of (the) deity-to-come at the end of all things (à la Frank Tipler's "Omega Point"). This concept, as I've interpreted it, is pandeism. Austere and remote, even cold, as it seems, I hope you can get something from it you may need in order to get through your crisis.

:death: :flower:

A God isn't necessary in my view. But that we consciously go on after death does matter. Just physically configuring only to be unassembled to be used for another task equally pointless and possibly random doesn't inspire confidence that we or our gift of intelligence ever was held in any esteem by the universe on the whole.

If I understand you correctly, why does 'eternal life in the omni-memory of the ultimate being/omega point' seem to you "equally pointless and possibly random ..."?

I am not familiar with omega point or omni-memory. My concern is that we do end in all forms after physical death making everything before and after just castles in the sand.

Okay. If so, so what? Why isn't this brief interval enough for you? We spend about one-third of our lives asleep, and oblivious, without any assurance that we will awaken again and yet knowing one day soon we will not awaken. Nonetheless, without anxiety, don't you welcome deep sleep? You might not be "familiar with the omega point, etc", Thinker, but, like everyone else, you are familiar with this nightly flicker of eternal oblivion...

Because it implies that we didn't matter. We matter to each other while we're alive. But if we cease and get recycled into plant food what mattered to us doesn't matter anymore because we could not keep those matters alive because they are as limited as I hope we're not.

We matter to ourselves and one another because all those who came before us mattered to themselves and one another had existed. We will matter implicitly to all those who will exist long after we are gone and forgotten just as all who came before us and now are forgotten implicitly matter to us insofar they ineluctably had bequeathed to us our existence.

Anyway. If you reflect on your mortality, Thinker, and it seems to you that ultimately nothing matters, consider that this nihilism – idea-feeling – also entails that "ultimate nothing matters" also ultimately doesn't matter, that is, nihilism is self-refuting nonsense. And this too: how would 'immortality' make your life feel any less "equally pointless and possibly random" than it feels to you here and now? :chin:

Because if I were immortal in any form in a universe where nothing else is, it would become clear that we do matter. It takes only one world ending event to end the cycle of humans.

The universe necessarily will outlast its "immortal" inhabitants and yet its configuration and composition (i.e. complexity) is not everlasting (re: cosmic entropy); therefore, by your logic, neither "immortals" nor (this) universe in themselves matter.

I don't remember starting this conversation, but I think I was assuming an existence that doesn't interact with the physical world in a way we can detect. And I'm assuming we can't detect much if our thoughts on the origins of the universe shift a lot each time we get a new telescope resolution.

As far as things having real meaning I don't consider only now in which I can feel a sense of pride for what came before, but also the knowledge that any knowledge or perceptions during this life could be voided out upon death making any previous perceptual functions exist as little after as before, so what makes them important during. Without a clear purpose what can we know, and with our lifespans being virtually nothing compared to the duration of the universe how can we even determine themes and patterns.

I [am] assuming an existence that doesn't interact with the physical world in a way we can detect. — TiredThinker

For us, then, that is nonexistence (i.e. fiction (e.g. ghosts)).

... if our thoughts on the origins of the universe shift a lot each time we get a new telescope resolution

'Cosmogenic speculations' change far more rapidly in response to more precise and more varied observations than our well-tested cosmological theories which are glacially updated. There are not "a lot of shifts" in our knowledge, just click-bait press buzz about the latest computer-assembled telescope images du jour. Imho, metaphysical reflection – "our thoughts on the origins of the universe" – is not impaired, or informed, by mere 'scientific speculations' alone.

Without a clear purpose what can we know, and with our lifespans being virtually nothing compared to the duration of the universe how can we even determine themes and patterns.

I don't understand what you mean. Elaborate (or reformulate)..

our continued existence — TiredThinker

How about telling us what you mean by "our" - or "my" if you want to substitute - and as well "continued" and "existence." In this context, I think that work and effort needed. Or maybe more simply, if existence/ing as a being is the sum of us, and that ended, then what could be left of what isn't any more?

Without seeing a theme and patterns in our own lives in reference to all of time we can't get a sense of why we're here and what we're building towards if anything other than to spread DNA around like Nick Canon. Lol. We may than have no real purpose. We only exist with the characteristics needed to live at this time (except maybe children that die before adulthood who didn't get that luxury). I think we need a much longer existence to get any real sense of why we exist.

Purpose is contingent on a mind(agency) so asking whether there is, is a, purpose is the same as asking were we created by a God(mind), or some other process(no mind). Philosophy can answer this and the answer is, we don’t know.

Mysticism takes it a step further and says, if there’s a purpose there must be evidence of it here somewhere. You just can’t get there through logic, you have to use other means.

Religion says you can talk(prey) to the mind that created us and do good works.

:fire: ... imagine Sisyphus happy.

I think the longer one lives the more adaptive habits suffice and the less one needs a "real purpose". I aspire to the condition of a 'happy immortal': to affirm existing as an end in itself like music ... amor fati.

:flower:

Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death. If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present. Our life has no end in the way in which our visual field has no limits. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

:death:

Every tale demands a suspension of disbelief; every game requires an acceptance of made up rules. every mathematical construction begins with axioms. Whether the universe is an educational toy or mere entertainment for us eternal beings, it naturally works best on its own terms without prior and post knowledge. For instance, if everyone knew in advance that virtue will be infallibly rewarded and vice punished in the afterlife, then it would be mere common self-centred sense to act virtuously and avoid vices, and thus no sign of virtue at all. Likewise, an exam where the answers are provided with the questions provides no measure of students' attainment, but becomes a copying exercise.