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Plato 's Allegory Of The Cave Essay

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The lasting condition impressed by an image can sometimes like as a flame, spreading throughout other discourses for long after its initial kindling. Such is the case with Plato 's allegory of the cave, which has for over 2,500 years inspired significant contributions to theorizations of truth. Despite the age of Plato 's work, the truth in the allegory is demonstrated by its own universality; as a formative piece of literature, the story acts as a gateway into Western discourses of truth. Truth remains an elusive quality, particularly when it is elevated to a universal value. Elevation as such brings into question the possibility of universal truth. The allegory of the cave renders a depiction of truth as a universal value that appears at once illuminating, damaging, and unforgiving — but this much only ever seeks to assert a version of truth fashioned by Socrates Plato himself sought to replicate. To analyze the enduring quality of Plato 's work, the tools the author himself uses need to be investigated first. In one of his classic dialogues, Plato utilizes the character of Socrates, a stand-in for the real philosopher that educated the author. Socrates in Plato 's work is in some ways an idealization of the lived thought of one of Western thought 's most celebrated philosophers. Socrates discusses with another Greek, Glaucon, the image of a cave in which inhabitants are shackled, forced to view nothing but a wall and shadows upon it projected from other light sources. A

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