Compare And Contrast Plato's Allegory Of The Cave

Plato, an Ancient Greek and highly esteemed philosopher, is best known for his text, The Republic. More specifically, though, it is his “Allegory of the Cave” in Book VII of this text that draws most scholars to him. This specific allegory has been used by writers for hundreds of years, including Frederick Douglass. In his work, “Narrative of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself”, Douglass takes his own personal journey from slavery to freedom and applies it to the pre-existing form that Plato created in his allegory. The parallels between these two texts are uncanny and it does not take much for the reader to see that Douglass’ narrative is much more than the physical journey he describes - that he is in fact escaping from the cave that Plato once illustrated.

“Anyone who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the light, or from going into the light, which is true of the mind’s eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye…” (Plato). In this quote from Plato’s “The Allegory of the Cave” an instance in which a person comes face to face with something that confounds them, it can be due to two factors. First, it could be that they are knowledgeable and are paying attention and go to seeing ignorance. Or it could be that they are not knowledgeable and are faced with veracity. A situation such as this takes place in Plato’s

Knowledge is the perception by sentient beings of an upper world filled with ideas and pure forms of objects instead of the material, real-world forms that these sentient beings sense. Plato, in his Allegory of the Cave, uses an analogy between prisoners chained in a cave who can only see reality as shadows on the wall. In his story, one escapes, and discovers the “true” world of reality above, but when he returns, none of his friends believe him and they say that one would be a fool for going to the true world of perception. Plato claims through Socrates, “The world of our sight is like the habitation in prison, the fire-light there to the sunlight here, the ascent and the view of the upper world is the rising of the soul into the world of

In “Allegory of the Cave”, the initial surfacing into the light world was a tedious experience for the cave dweller, however once exposed to the light, he is also exposed to many new ideas. After spending time with others who are enlightened, he begins to pick up on some of the values and standards practiced, as they are much different from those experienced in the cave. One ideology expressed in the enlightened world is that of good vs. bad. Though some may use their knowledge in a malicious and selfish manner, many understand that “the idea of good appears last of all…. and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual,” (Plato 95-97). Finding what is truly good in the world “appears last of all”, as one must use their experiences to fully understand the true meaning of what is good. In the beginning, the prisoner can only see the negative aspects of the situation, as he is living in a new reality with foreign concepts that reject his previous thought. However, like everyone else, he is born with the ability to become enlightened, it is just his experiences out of the cave that will generate the knowledge needed for him to reach that enlightened state. The concept of good is conceived as the “parent/lord of light”, as the representation of light in the outside world is used to show the enlightened state one will experience while in it. With the knowledge of what is truly good, the prisoner will finally be able to understand the ideas of this new reality, as well us understand the true impact that being able to leave the world of shadows has on a person. Like the prisoner, Neo is also able to understand the

At various times in our lives, every person has asked themselves a varied version of the same questions: What is “reality”, moreover what determines our perception of reality, and what am I supposed to do with (or about) it? Throughout “Allegory of the Cave,” Plato attempts to answer these questions. Plato suggests that humans have a constrained view of the world, and that reality consist of two different perceptions, a "bodily eye” and a “mind’s eye.” The “mind’s eye”, the hypothetical site of visual recollection or imagination, involves a higher level of thinking. This eye emerges after the prisoners have been released from their chains and begin exploring the outside world. The “bodily eye,” a metaphor for the senses, relies on sensory images about the world in order to form conceptions of reality. This is the only eye present inside the cave where the prisoners’ confined.

Imagine a place where palm trees sway back and forth to the rhythm of the tide rushing in. Imagine the beautiful clear waters that hold many varieties of sea creatures that we can admire from far away. Imagine soaking toes in the water and through the sand. We are not talking about a vacation. We are talking about an escape from the real reality of life where everything is utopian like. This magical escape from reality is called paradise. Paradise is derived from Latin and Greek and comes from the term paradis in French. It is not your usual vacation where one can go to relax and return to daily life. It is nearly perfection.

The Greek philosopher, Plato, explored many themes in his writings, including justice, beauty, and equality, as well as sub-discussions within each work. Throughout The Republic, he seeks to define justice in its purest form and provide solutions to unanswered questions. In early books, Plato identifies political justice as harmony in a structured political body. Ideally, this perfect, harmonious society would be composed of three primary classes. The first being producers, the second warriors, and the last rulers. Specifically in Books V and VII, Plato focuses on the rulers of society, referring to them as philosopher-kings. Using three distinct analogies, these being the allegories of the sun, the line, and the cave, Plato explains who these individuals are while simultaneously defining his Theory of Forms. In Book VII of The Republic, Plato presents the last of the analogies—the allegory of the cave—through the dialogue of Socrates.

Both Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and The Matrix deal with determining which world is perceived as actuality and which is really reality. It is only if the prisoners are shown the figures that make up the shadows and sees the colors that make up the real world, can you change their perception of reality. Neo seeing reality for what it really is showed him that he was living an illusion. Neo takes it upon himself to save humanity from widespread ignorance and acceptance of a false reality.

1.) Socrates Nietzsche’s critique that Socrates suffered life is fair. He wrote that Socrates put on a good demeanor towards life. The Allegory of the cave shows that actually Socrates suffered life. Plato has Socrates describe prisoners who lived bounded near the barrier of the cave.

“By Achieving this awareness, they come to perceive reality differently; by broadening the horizon of their perception, they discover more easily in their background awareness the dialectical relations between the two dimensions of reality,” (Freire, 115). Paulo Freire’s, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, was written over three-thousand years after Plato and his own work, The Republic, but the two contain very similar messages. Freire proposes to his readers that the oppressed are being dehumanized. With this dehumanization follows a lack of education and the oppressed peoples understanding of liberation. Although modern terminology such as ‘banking education’ and ‘problem-posing’ replace creative stories of caves and shadows figures, many of Plato’s

In The Matrix, a movie with strong parallels to the allegory, the titular environment is a computer-generated illusion of reality in which people have been deceived to believe the Matrix is real. In the same way, Plato’s allegory begins with men underground who have been chained all their lives. All they know of reality are the shadows that a fire behind them reflects onto a wall on which the prisoners’ chains force them to observe. When one of the prisoners is freed, he is taught to understand what is truly real, not merely the shadows that he knew before. Through the guidance of an instructor, his mind transitions from the unenlightened mind of one who lived in the cave, to the enlightened mind of one who truly knows reality (Plato

Plato explores his idea of Forms in the Allegory of the Cave. Plato describes this simple setting of men living tied up in a cave, surrounded by darkness and only being able to see the shadows of objects due to a flame behind them. They give names to these shadows because that is the only reality they have been given since birth. This is essentially all they are aware of. Once one of the men break free he realizes that up to that point everything he is aware of is actually false. There is a real world beyond the cave and the man is able to explore that. After experiencing some sort of joy from the lightness in the upper world he returns to the cave to share what he has learned only to be criticized and killed for trying to release the other

So for these prisoners who had spent all their lives inside this darkness with their neck and body chained up, it’s reasonable for them to see nothing of the world but the shadows on the wall, and hear no sounds but that coming from the shadows themselves. Wouldn’t their concept of the world boil down to just that sight and that sound? What if one of the prisoners was freed from his shackles, wouldn 't he see the bright light from the entrance and start walking towards it in curiosity? And just as he goes far enough, wouldn 't seeing the bright light for the first time glare his eyes? This overwhelming irritation and blindness would make him want to come back into the darkness of that cave, for he saw better there. Yet, if someone were to go against his will and pull him back out, would he get to see the world beyond the cave, after taking some time for the eyes to adjust? It would be a slow process, but once he got used to the glares, he could see his own shadow, at first, then the reflection of him and the world on the water, then finally he could look at the sun, and in time he would realise that this sun is what governs the world around him, causing day to turn to night, and spring to summer.  What if he was to be pulled back inside the cave, would he not have to take the same amount of time for eyes to familiarise itself with the darkness? Wouldn’t the darkness blind him the same way the bright light did? Our eyes are the same as the mind in the way both

In The Matrix, Neo realizes his world is in reality a computer generated world, in which people only live simulated lives, evident of being unreal. The movie portrays the world as ersatz, it is a venue that allows people to live a seeming normal life, but in reality they do not. This is very much how prisoners of the Allegory of the Cave reason the shadows they see are real. By believing this, the prisoners of the Allegory of the Cave, and people living in the Matrix, are living an illusion of the mind. An acknowledgement by Descartes is that “to continue this way is impossible, and it is not a realistic way to live” (Descartes, 1641).

Plato’s Allegory of The Cave can be described through the array of different elements he has used to explain his metaphor. He equates those uneducated in the theory of the forms and true philosophy to prisoners who are chained in a cave, unable to turn their heads around. All these prisoners are able to see is the wall of the cave in front of them, although they are unable to see it behind the cinemas is a fire burning. Between these prisoners and the fire is a walkway that the puppeteers use when holding up the puppets that cast shadows on the wall of the cave in view of the prisoners. The prisoners cannot see the puppeteers or the objects/puppets they are holding because they are moving behind them, they are oblivious to the real objects