Pascal's Wager Revisited

[Jenny A]

The argument makes no reference to any particular religion or to the idea of "religion" at all. Insofar as it talks about God, it builds up a slice of him, that is, unlocks some of his attributes (creative, etc.), in the process of showing the reasonableness of this God's existence.

Wait a minute, I didn't see any argument for the reasonableness of god's existence.  And before you even begin to talk about building up a slice of god, why don't you define god.  How can we talk about whether it's likely that anything exists if we can't define that thing.

I am explicitly not conceiving of the next life as an external reward for this one but as a natural outcome of one's search for virtue and happiness in this one. If I am hungry and make a sandwich for myself, is the sandwich a "reward" or a consequence and consummation of previous work?

I'm not sure what you mean. I see no reason to see the next life as a natural outcome of this one.  The natural outcome of this life appears to be death and no more.

If you mean that virtue and the search for happiness are their own reward, I agree.  But I don't usually start looking for happiness by making up supernatural beings.   Like hallucinogens, making up things up to believe in, might possibly lead to euphoria; but it's a rather unsound basis for happiness.   Making things up to believe in (lying to oneself) sounds like a profoundly backwards way to attempt a virtuous life.   Truth and virtue are very much connected.

The intuition is that human improvement is such a fundamental feature of our lives that we are led to the idea that it continues forever. But we can't conquer death on our own; so, perhaps there is something that helps us, in a (purposively?) hidden way.

Whether we can or cannot improve ourselves beyond a certain point, has absolutely nothing to do with whether there is any higher power that can or will (seen or unseen, or even purposelessly hidden).  But ceasing the attempt ourselves on the grounds that it would be nice if something else would do the heavy lifting for us, is a surefire way of bring human improvement to an end.

Nor am I at all sure that immortality would be the ultimate improvement in human life.  Christianity has a rather morbid fascination with death.  That all things may cease, makes things more not less valuable.

This is not one of the more worked out arguments I have for God. It's an idea to ponder in one's more contemplative moments.

It isn't as far as I can tell, an argument for god at all.   It's wishful thinking tied up in a bow of verbiage.