Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Plato's allegory of the cave

          Today in western civ we read Plato's allegory of the cave.  An allegory is a story based off of something else.  In this story, a group of people was held in a cave with their heads permanently facing a wall where shadows were projected from fire and puppets behind them.  This is all that these people knew for their entire life, so it became normal to them and they eventually began competing with each other to guess what would come next and so forth.  then one day one person was dragged out of the cave, where the sun burned his eyes as did the light of anything outside of the cave.  then after a time, his eyes would adjust in order to see the light.  Once he saw the light he might return to the cave to enlighten his friends about the true world, but when he does so they might attempt to kill him.
         This entire story is an allegory of Socrates.  He was the man dragged out to face the light of the world, and experience education and enlightenment.  This entire story places pain all-around change and new things which for most people is true.  People in the greater sense are unwilling to change, and in the rare case that someone does change there are estranged, or "put to death".  This story follows Socrates's almost exactly.  He was the most enlightened person in all of Athens.  His eyes had adjusted to see the light of other cultures, but the greek population was held back and forced to look at whatever they were told, and they cam to accept it.  then when someone else speeds in an attempt to open there eyes to the sun, Socrates, he was literally put to death.
         

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