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Reflection about the allegory of the cave
Allegory of the cave essay summary and analysis by Plato
Reflection about the allegory of the cave
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Plato tells us that the prisoners are confused on their emergence from the cave and that the prisoners’ will be blinded once they had been freed from the cave. After a period of time they will adjust their eyesight and begin to understand the true reality that the world poses. The stubbornness to develop a different perspective is seen in much of today’s society. The allegory of the cave is an understanding of what the true world is and how many people never see it because of their views of the society they are raised in.
Plato compares a number of things in this essay- the material world to the world of ideas, the life of the mind to work of governing, silver and gold to virtue and wisdom. How does he use his comparisons to make his arguments? 2.)Plato creates the Allegory of the Cave to be a conversation between his mentor Socrates and one of his student Glaucon. Plato sets the story to demonstrate that the “blinded” prisoner or in a more cultural sense the men of iron. The Greeks created 4 classes of civilization the gold,silver,bronze and the iron.
Plato’s Republic, Book 7, talks about the metaphor referred to as "the allegory of the cave. " This metaphor in philosophy is use to describe the importance and effect education or lack of education has on the human mind. In book VII, education is referred to as a light that brightens the different paths that exist in life. It helps open the human mind to things that it was unaware of. Another point made in book VII, was that by educating yourself you become less ignorant to what is out there in the world.
Within the story of Watchmen, multiple characters experience what Plato philosophized in the Allegory of the Cave. In order to understand how Plato’s allegory is used in context of Watchmen, one must first learn how Plato intended his philosophy to be interpreted. Plato’s Allegory of the Cave is a fictional narrative that revolves around the life of a prisoner in an unusual circumstance. This prisoner along with others have been locked underground since childhood.
There is an age-old desire within all of us to prove that are right – to prove that what we have to say is the truth – and oftentimes we will do whatever it takes to prove that fact. Whether it is the sense of pride we get when we realize we’re right or the pleasure we receive from correcting people and changing their ways, everyone wants to be told that they know a truth about something. Yes, we want to prove ourselves, but at what cost? At what point does our quest for a god-like and error-free existence become detrimental to the way we live and interact with those around us? It is not until we lose sight of the purpose of right and wrong as moral educational tools and begin to see them as a way to achieve superiority, that we fall into a
1) In the allegory of the cave, Plato’s main goal is to illustrate his view of knowledge. A group of prisoners have been chained in a cave their whole lives and all they have ever been exposed to were shadows on the wall and voices of people walking by. The prisoners in the cave represent humans who only pay attention to the physical aspects of the world (sight and sound). Once one of them escapes and sees the blinding light, all he wants is to retreat back to the cave and return to his prior way of living. This shows that Plato believes enlightenment and education are painful, but the pain is necessary for enlightenment and it is worth it.
Socrates’s allegory of the cave in Plato’s Republic Book VII is an accurate depiction of how people can be blinded by what they are only allowed to see. The allegory does have relevance to our modern world. In fact, all of us as a species are still in the “cave” no matter how intelligent or enlightened we think we have become. In Plato’s Republic Book VII, Socrates depicts the scenario in a cave where there are prisoners who are fixed only being able to look at the shadows on the wall which are projections of things passing between them and the light source.
How does the story "The Machine Stops" echo the sentiments of Plato in "The Allegory of the Cave"? "The Machine Stops," The two main characters, Vashti and her son Kuno, live on opposite sides of the world. Vashti is content with her life, which, like most people of that world, she spends producing and endlessly discussing secondhand 'ideas '. Kuno, however, is a sensualist and a rebel. He tells Vashti that he has visited the surface of the Earth without permission, and without the life support apparatus supposedly required to survive in the toxic outer air, and he saw other humans living outside the world of the Machine.
#2 Plato’s Allegory In Modern Day Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” is about the human perspective and enlightenment. In todays society Plato’s allegory is still relevant and is deeply rooted in education. College students are a perfect analogy for the “Allegory of the Cave”. We are told from the very beginning that we need to have an education to be successful in life.
Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” entails Socrates explaining to Glaucon how all human beings are educated and the effect that has on them; he uses an allegory, a story with two levels of meaning, in order to illustrate his explanation. The story begins by describing a cave that people have lived in since birth and have been chained to in one place, unable to look anywhere except straight-ahead of them. Little do they know that behind them is a fire, and behind the fire is a half-wall with statues on top of it being controlled by another group of people beyond the wall. Due to the fire, these statues have shadows which are projected on the wall in front of the chained prisoners leading them to believe that these shadows are in fact reality. They
Searching for the truth is very challenging, as the world today entrenched in lies. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” briefly tells a story about cavemen being chained on most parts of their body, restring all movement including their head, since childhood. Then, he discussed the consequences inflicted onto the cavemen, specifically their perspective towards the truth after being chained for a long period of time in the dark cave, which resembles many events occurring in a person’s daily life. Based on the discussed effects, the author argues that human beings should always seek the real meaning of truth.
The state of most human beings is depicted in this myth of the cave and the tale of a thrilling exit from the cave is the source of true understanding. Plato has portrayed the concept of reality and illusion through the allegory of the cave. One of Socrates' and also of Plato's, chief ideas was that of forms, which explains that the world is made up of reflections of more perfect and ideal forms. In the Cave
He showed five men chained in a cave. They couldn 't see anything, just the shadows of the projections that other men put in front of the fire. Plato said that the shadows were the closest thing they had to reality. Later on, one of the prisoners get free and gets the opportunity to go out and see the true world, so he realized that the shadows were not real. The freeman was amazed at all these new things he had seen and learned of, so when he got back to the cave the other four men laugh at him because they thought he was crazy.
Are we always at the mercy of others and our own experiences? Are the truths we cling to always reality? Are we ever truly free or are we always prisoners in our own mind? These are some of the questions that went through my mind while reading Plato’s allegory of the cave. Through them I’ve come to understand one of the biggest themes in this allegory is our ability to “shackle” ourselves mentally, but also our ability to free ourselves if only we have the courage.
In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave the people think that their entire reality is the shadows that they see on the walls of the cave. Plato explores the truth and criticizes that humanity does not question what is real. Plato explores that the human understanding and accepting of what is real is difficult and
