UC Irvine

In this thesis, I discuss Iris Murdoch’s philosophical concept of moral attention, drawing primarily from her essay, “The Idea of Perfection.” I suggest that her thinking is a distinctive example of philosophical synthesis that bridges multiple intellectual traditions. Writing against a mid-twentieth century movement that Murdoch characterized as an “existentialist-behaviorist” view that reduced moral life to isolated moments of choice, Murdoch offers an account of moral development that is centered around the patient and continuous work of loving attention. Drawing on Simone Weil's spiritual psychology, Wittgensteinian descriptive method, and Platonic metaphysics, Murdoch proposed that moral progress occurs primarily through inner transformation. This thesis argues that Murdoch has a synthetic intellectual method that integrates different writers commonly considered to belong to both continental and analytic philosophical traditions as well as from literature, religious thought, and psychology. Her work thus serves to demonstrate the value of cross-disciplinary thinking. Furthermore, in a contemporary era characterized by fractured attention and increasing academic specialization, Murdoch's emphasis on sustained, loving attention to reality offers both a compelling moral psychology and a model for the kind of integrative thinking in which humanistic education flourishes. Rather than providing instrumentalist solutions to contemporary educational challenges, Murdoch's work reminds us that moral life begins in how we see, suggesting that the cultivation of attention itself represents a foundational ethical and pedagogical practice.