Plato, through the spoken words of Socrates, attempts to illustrate the value of education in the form of an allegory to Glaucon. In book seven of Plato’s Republic, Socrates verbalizes a realization that the average person living within their society could both think and speak without any cognizance of the Forms. In the allegory, Plato likens people untutored in the theory of Forms to prisoners chained in a cave; with this he begins to lead Glaucon to understand the difference between genuine knowledge and opinion or belief. The allegory of the cave is supposed to explain how the people of society can appear to function well without any knowledge of Forms. Socrates invites Glaucon to imagine prisoners who have been chained since childhood
Naturally, when the people walked across with their various artefacts the prisoners would only see their shadows and if a traveller was to talk, they would logically assume that the sound or voice had come from the shadow. The shadows represent the perceptions of non- philosophers in the world and the cave represent those who think that knowledge comes from what we see and hear in the world. The next part of the analogy is to ask what would happen if a prisoner was set free from their chains and would finally have the ability to turn their head around and see things as they really are. The prisoner would struggle greatly to take in this new environment and would undoubtedly be blinded by the light of the fire. The prisoner would then be dragged out of the cave against his will and have the sunlight forced upon him .He would find the sunlight painful and would not be able to take anything in until he adjusted to the light.
The shadows represent our experiences/perceptions. The journey out of the cave shows us reaching for the reality of the outside world by escaping from our chains of flawed senses and using our minds. The escaped prisoner represents the philosopher, like Plato himself. Being a rationalist, Plato uses reasoning and his innate knowledge to understand the concept of the Forms. The philosopher then goes back into the cave to try and share his ideas with the other prisoners.
Most of them only engage in the experiment for the money, none of them new exactly what was actually going to happen. It was supposed to be a safe environment to study weather the violent in prison was due to the prison setting, or is it due to the personalities of the prisoner and guards that causes the violence. One of the biggest mistakes that were done in this experiment was that Zimbardo himself was one of the participants of his own experiment, which I think had a huge effect on the course of the events. Since He was the superintendent he was on the guards’ side instead of just observing without any influence of the direction of the experiment. Another ethical problem accrue when there is an invasion of privacy of the participants, like when the prisoners were stripped naked.
This also ties into Socrates’ “Allegory of the Cave”. In it, Socrates explains that if we are showed the same non-existent thing, we start to believe it. The people in the “Allegory of the Cave” are chained in a cave, facing a rock wall. The images presented on the wall are what they presume to be real. Without the proper teaching, they obviously believe what they see.
The light at the end of the cave represents the good in life, the perfection in the world in front of us. The shadows that are able to be seen in the cave are the illusions that we allow ourselves to believe is real, what we created, or what we wanted to see instead of what is truth. Q2: When Plato compares silver and good to virtue and wisdom he is trying to relay the foolishness of men when the put more value in material things rather than things, such as virtue and wisdom, which are eternal and matter the most in life. Those who live in their own realities work to gain material things rather than gaining knowledge. “Then, I said, the business of us who are the founders of the State will be to compel the best minds to attain that knowledge which we have already shown to be the greatest of all—they must continue to ascend until they arrive at the good;…” ("Plato's "Allegory of the Cave"" 50 Essays A PORTABLE ANTHOLOGY.
Corrective action is needed to repair the minds of humanity, who have long-lived in a world where continuity equals comfort. Although in the allegory, Plato’s hypothetical detainees are forced, society in its usual, redundant state is similar to the cave and its fixed position. Inside the cave, shadows represent the totality of the prisoner’s existence – it is impossible for them to imagine a reality which consists of anything other than the morphing shadows on the wall. Change can usually elicit fear and naturally humans may protest change. An option to retreat to the upper world would be feared by the cave dwelling people.
Socrates also states that if he is attempting to injure the state; even after these liberties that they provided him and every other Athenian citizen (Plato 227) , then he is making the right descision. Socrates was aware of the law and the consequences of breaking those laws. The government also gave him ample oppertunity for an alternative such as exile but Socrates did not take it. He also had the right to leave the city and go wherever he pleased if he was not content with the laws or way of life. (Plato, 227).
This philosophy contradicts with that of other philosophers, whose beliefs rest on the pursuit and building of knowledge. It can be concluded that other philosophers aspire to obtain as much knowledge as possible, while Socrates is in search of only the underlying truth. Knowledge is the common idea of The Apology and The Allegory of the Cave. The Allegory serves as a metaphor that illustrates the effects of knowledge on the human spirit. It begins with a group of people, trapped in a dark cave since birth.
For Oedipus, ignorance would have been bliss. In the case of Plato’s ‘Allegory of the Cave’, once the prisoner is released he is forced to look upon the fire and objects that were his reality. He realizes these new images in front of him are now the accepted forms of reality. Plato describes the vision of the real truth in one way to the prisoners. Thus, they do not realize that they are looking at shadows on a wall and that there is an entire world outside the cave for them to experience.