Explain Plato’s Analogy of the Cave
Plato’s analogy of the cave is from his book “The Republic”, a work about how society ought to be organised for an idealist utopian world, how humans should behave and what the world really is. A. N. Whitehead is famously quoted as saying “all philosophy is footnotes to Plato” i.e. he wrote the most influential writings and has, according to some, shaped all subsequent ideas, including that of Augustine, the Christian philosopher who was highly influenced by his work, and Bertrandt Russell, philosopher and author of ‘A History of Western Philosophy’ suggests that Plato, as opposed to Aristotle, “had the greater effect on subsequent ages”. “The Analogy of the Cave” summarises some of Plato’s key ideas and conveys the importance of reasoning and logic, precedent over empirical knowledge or opinion. It is written in dialogue form between the two characters of Glaucon and Socrates, the latter being Plato’s teacher, who was persecuted for his philosophical ideas. The Cave is one of three allegorical stories, relating to his Theory of Forms and conveying Plato’s ideas through symbolism as opposed to straightforward statements.
The analogy tells of how there are prisoners chained in a cave, bound in chains so they may only face the wall in front of them, with the only light coming from a fire far behind them. In front of the flames lies a wall, and like a ‘Punch and Judy’ show, puppets or statues held by others are carried back and forth across this wall, interacting and thus creating shadows on the wall in front of the prisoners. These shadows are all the prisoners see, and the voices of the puppet show echoing around the cave are all they hear. These prisoners represent the people of the physical world, the unenlightened beings that only see the shadows, which are forms of what we think are real everyday objects and people. These shadows are even further distorted to the uneven lighting from the fire. The prisoner’s vision of the shadows can be referred to as ‘eikasia’, (from the Greek ‘eikon’, an image or likeness), meaning to perceive things as real, though they are not. They accept this reality without question as the prisoners know only of the cave, being there since childhood, and they accept all they receive from their senses. This form of knowledge, Plato believed to be entirely unreliable, as it is only opinion and relative.
