Collaborative Pairings

Farrell’s model of a collaborative circle predicts that much of the creative work is conducted within pairings in which instrumental intimacy—the sharing of unpublished and often unwritten ideas—occurs. This chapter examines two key such pairings in the Oxford Group, between Peter Singer and Ros Godlovitch, and between Peter Singer and Richard Ryder. The chapter considers the impact on Singer’s intellectual development of his association with the Oxford Group in general and Ryder and Ros Godlovitch in particular. It demonstrates how the transformation in Singer’s thinking about animals was startling. He learned from Godlovitch and Ryder in particular but, at the same time, he impacted their thought too. It is plausible to suggest that Singer’s participation in the Oxford Group was a vital component of his emergence as the most important animal ethicist.