6/9/2023 0 Comments Plato and the caveSeveral scholars have interpreted the Allegory as saying that those who know the truth will suffer for it like Socrates, because the minds of the majority are only directed at the unreal. I then argue that he provides clues sufficient forand designed to encouragereading the Meditations on First Philosophy in the. I begin by offering some reminders of the broadly Platonic nature of Cartesian dualism. Socrates, like the prisoner who tried to tell the truth and urged people to change but was not believed and attacked instead. My aim in this paper is to push this interpretative tendency a step further, by bringing out Descartes indebtedness to Plato. Many commentators see in the allegory allusions to Socrates and how he was driven to his death by the Athenians. This idea has been criticized as undemocratic as it argues that only the few should rule. Because most people are ignorant, they are not fit to be involved in politics. Plato believes that the rule of Philosophers is the best form of government. Those who have seen the Forms are wise and have knowledge of the goods. Those who only know the shadows (sensible world) are the majority of people and are ignorant and irrational. As a result, they have a duty to help their fellows who are still in ignorance. Because of their knowledge, they understand goodness and abhor the immoral. This is because the majority are in error, like the chained prisoners, and are hostile to the wise who have seen the real world because they contradict popular beliefs.įor Plato, only those who know the Forms know the truth and should be leaders. It also shows, however, that enlightenment is challenging, as seen in the escaped prisoner’s problems with the chained men in the cave. The cave itself is a metaphor for the societal boundaries within which we live, content with but largely unaware of the nature of our collectively defined reality. Next, this prisoner is dragged out of the cave into the world above. Despite the age of Plato’s philosophical texts, they have held the same general interpreted meaning throughout the centuries following his time. He has made contact with real thingsthe statuesbut he is not aware that there are things of greater realitya world beyond his cave. This stage in the cave represents belief. It also argues that everyone can know the truth, like the escaped prisoner, and become wise, if they only turn their mind to the Forms. He accepts the statues and fire as the most real things in the world. The allegory shows the two-fold nature of Plato’s view of reality. Like the prisoner, those who see the Forms will reject the old view of reality and want to know more about the truth, which can only be known intellectually. The escape of the prisoner from the darkness to the outside world reflects the rise of the soul from the sensible realm to the that of the Ideas, which is where truth resides. Most people live in ignorance as a result. This is because they assume knowledge of the senses, and not the forms. Most people are only aware of the shadows and not the real world. The cave and its shadows are the world of the sense, the fire is the sun, and the external world is the realm of Ideas. Socrates, who is really only speaking the ideas of Plato, explains the allegory to Glaucon.
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