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.