Plato Allegory Of The Cave

Hatice Çayır

2012202009

Phil 341 THE MORAL GOODNESS IN PLATO AND KANT

Ethics, as a one of the main branchs of philosophy, has many concerns. Some of the problems it deals with has been dissolved, some of them still need to be examined. Besides all changes in the subjects of ethics, the idea of the good has been preserved its importance throughout history of philosophy and remain as an indescribable subject. In different periods, different philosophers concentrate on the idea of good from different perspectives. Nonetheless, they have carried similarities while considering on some topics such as ; the qualification of good, whether the good is intrinsically good or what makes an action good. Among them, Plato

However, what we are evaluating now is just how gooodness takes place in the metaphor. In the allegory, the outside of the cave is the place where he reaches forms. The world of forms stands for reality in which everything is endless and perfect, whereas the cave represents just the copy of reality and all the things inside it changeable and imperfect. In the allegory, the concept of the good has its place in the centre of the metaphor. In order to explain the good, Plato uses the image of the Sun. Just as the Sun in the allegory of the cave has highests position and necesseray in order to see other things, the form of the good is the highest form among them and causes all other

Regarding both Platonic and Kantian view on goodness, they give internal standards for morality and focus on internal motives while evaluating morality. However, Stocker claims that many morally significant jobs, such as feeding the sick, can be done equally well pretty much irrespective of motive. He also gives referance to the other philosophers in order to show that morality should not be based on the harmony between value and motive: ‘as Ross, at times joined by Mill, argues, for a large part of ethics,there simply is no philosophical question of harmony or disharmony between value and motive: you can do what is right, obligatory, your duty no matter what your motive for so acting. If it is your duty to keep a promise, you fulfill that duty no matter whether you keep the promise out of respect for duty, fear of losing your reputation, or whatever. What motivates is irrelevant so far as rightness, obligatoriness, duty are