ABSTRACT
Iris Murdoch’s Inclusion of non-human animals within the bounds of love is both plausible and problematic. It gives rise to at least two significant difficulties. The first is a tension with our understanding of Murdoch as a Platonist. After all, Platonism has something of a bad reputation when it comes to valuing any non-human aspect of nature. The second is a worry that her understanding of love may inherit a covert egocentricity from Platonism. The first problem is easier to deal with. Plato’s attitude towards non-human animals is not what we might expect. But the second takes us to the heart of Murdoch’s ego-constraining ethics and the need to qualify her idea that the best kind of love is channelled outwards. Love always involves an awareness of self in relation to other, and any strict adherence to an outward-only approach would fail to do justice to our experience of what it is like to love.
