In his book The Republic, Plato explains why a philosopher should rule and why she is best suited to rule. Before he jumps to the answer however, he gives a clear insight into who he believes a philosopher is and how such philosophers will rule the Kallipolis. Plato gives the definition of a philosopher in Book V of The Republic, stating that philosophers strove to gain as much knowledge as they possibly could during their lives. This goes back to his argument that knowledge is equal to being just which is also equal to being happy. Thus, in order to fully understand what makes a complete “philosopher-king”, the origin and shaping of such philosophers must be analyzed as well as how they are put in charge of the nation they will rule. To begin with, Plato describes in detail how these philosophers can be identified from an early age and trained, in order for them to be the most effective rulers in the future. He states that only those who show an aptitude and a desire for …show more content…
The analogy takes place in a deep cave, where a group have lived there since birth without ever seeing outside. These people are also bound, so that they can only see what is in front of them. Behind them is a wall with a variety of statues on top of it and between them and the wall is a fire. Lying behind the partial wall are another group of people who are manipulating the statues on top of the wall. The statues, in addition to the fire, cast shadows across the wall that the prisoners are facing. The shadows being the only thing that these people can see, they believe that they are real things, referring to them in conversations about objects and living beings. In this analogy the prisoners represent imagination, the shadows represent images and perceptions, the fire represents the sun, and the statues represent physical