I recently read Existentialists and Mystics: Writings on Philosophy and Literature, a collection of philosophical writings by the late Iris Murdoch from 1951 to 1986.
I bought the book because I enjoyed her novels, although I admit don’t remember the plots of any of them clearly, and because of praise of her by Matthew Crawford, author of The World Beyond Your Head, which I admire and which I am re-reading as part of a reading group.
I admire Murdoch as a thinker, but there is much more in her thought than I could absorb in one reading.
What follows are ideas I took away from reading this book, which may or may not represent her thought.
One idea that, in order to perceive reality as it is, you must cleanse your mind of egotism and wish-fulfillment fantasy, which are the source of illusion.
This is true not only of scientists, writers, artists and religious mystics, but of everyday people.
She said, moreover, that those who look on life with a desire to be just and loving will comprehend the world in ways that the self-centered cannot.
Her example is a mother whose son marries a woman of a lower social class, whom she thinks is lacking in refinement. She always behaves nicely, and never lets her opinion of her daughter-in-law show.
But then she thinks she may be unfair, and makes an effort to look for good qualities in the daughter-in-law. She decides she is not vulgar but refreshingly simple, not undignified but spontaneous, not juvenile but youthful, and so on.
Her new perception changes her behavior not one whit. Nevertheless it has moral significance.
I’m reminded of a remark by Bertrand Russell in The Scientific Outlook. Russell said there are two motives for seeking knowledge. One is to better understand something or someone you wish to control. The other is to better appreciate something or someone that you love. And, he added, the pleasures of the lover are greater than the pleasures of the tyrant.
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