The prisoner becomes ‘enlightened’ and doesn’t want to go back to the cave, but returns to tell the other prisoners about what he has found. When he first goes back into the darkness, he cannot see. His eyes adjust to the darkness and he tells the other prisoners his story. However they are not convinced and don’t believe him, because they think the shadows are reality and wish to kill anyone who tells them not.
Plato's analogy of the cave is meant to explain our journey to ‘enlightenment’. The way Plato does this is by comparing an average person to another person who has lead an isolated life, living in a cave and only being able to look at shadows casted on a wall. The story is metaphoric and symbolic of the someone who has not started the journey to true knowledge or enlightenment and is living their life only seeing what they would like to see and what is on the surface, perceiving that as what is real and what is reality. The darkness and the cave symbolize a life and world of ignorance; a life living in imprisonment since birth and only being able to see a symbol of reality, which is in this case is the shadows, while the prisoners chained to the cave symbolize the ignorant people living in an ignorant world. The shadows they are seeing symbolize a world of false reality, which Plato considers simply an imitation of the real world. The world outside the cave, the world of ‘light’ symbolizes a world of spiritual reality, a world which can only be entered be breaking free from the cave. The prisoners’ journey out of the cave symbolizes an average person’s journey into the world of reality and wisdom through philosophy. Like the prisoner in the cave, this journey of knowledge is hard at the beginning which causes people to question themselves. However, once new found knowledge is gained, like the prisoner who was freed from the cave, people will want to use it wisely and not live a life of ignorance ‘in the cave’.
The sun represents truth and knowledge and the ‘form of good’ and is the origin and source of all other forms; without the sun there would be no light. Being temporarily blinded by the light from the sun symbolises enlightenment, because it allows the prisoner to see what is causing the shadows and allows them to discover a world that is ‘real’. The light is the light of knowledge and truth and not only is it a physical illumination, but it is also a mental illumination due to the fact it allows the prisoner to see enlightenment. Without the light he would be both physically and mentally blind and he would be without truth.
Plato argued that the world that we see is a world of illusions, of “shadows” of the real world of the Form. Plato thought that every object in the world corresponded with its form. However, there were many criticisms about his ideas.
Plato’s ideas cannot be proved as there is no evidence to support his ideas. It is not possible to prove the existence of any other world other than the world of appearances in which humans live in even if the other world is ‘the truth’ or reality. Many people would choose not to believe Plato anyway, as the world humans are surrounded by does seem ‘real’.
The allegory states the idea that the material world is inferior to the world of Forms. That means that we must escape from ‘the cave’ to find ‘Good’. It is not possible for good to be found in the sensible world; the world in which humans live in.
Also, if Plato believes that we see shadows of only some things then what other objects do we see shadows of? It could be asked whether that means horses are just shadows of an ultimate ‘perfect’ horse or whether our "perfect" idea of a table mean is "less perfect" than the ‘ultimate table’. If this idea is applied to humans it would mean that all of our supposedly perfect actions that we carry out such, as perfect relationships are not actually perfect.
People such as philosophers and scientists who have come out of the cave don’t always have the right or genuinely want to believe what they have seen. It may actually cause people anxiety or discomfort to experience a new world. Also, some people only get a partial view of reality, so only having only a slight understanding could lead to people having an even more distorted view on reality than they had originally.
To an extent everyone is ‘in the cave’. When applying the analogy to everyday life, no one will actually see absolute reality. Everyone sees forms. Understanding actual ‘reality’ and what lies outside the cave is a difficult process if people do not have the mental skill to understand it (and many people don’t), but not everyone who gets slightly out of the cave believes it and lots of people probably find it easier to not believe.
by
happyg (student)
