OUGD505: Covered/Research/Plato, The Republic Book V11

The Republic is a Socratic dialogue, written by Plato around 380 BC, concerning the definition of justice, the order and character of the just city-state and the just man.

“How could they see anything but the shadows if they were never allowed to move their heads?”  Plato, The Allegory of the Cave

In Book VII, Socrates presents the most beautiful and famous metaphor in Western philosophy: the allegory of the cave. This metaphor is meant to illustrate the effects of education on the human soul. Education moves the philosopher through the stages on the divided line, and ultimately brings him to the Form of the Good.

Theory of Forms

One of Socrates' (and Plato's) chief ideas was that of Forms, which explains that the world is made up of reflections of more perfect and ideal 'forms.' The material world--the one we can see, touch, hear, and smell--is really just half-seen images of the reality of the Forms. Relying on your physical senses alone--trusting what you see, for instance--is, to Socrates, making yourself effectively blind. The world we see is only a reflection of the Forms the world represents (and not even that accurately). A Form--whether it's a circle, or a table, or a tree, or a dog--is, for Socrates, the answer to the question, 'What is that?' Only understanding Forms can lead to true knowledge. Plato uses a parable, a short informative story, to illustrate 'forms' and the 'cave,' in his main work, The Republic (which first appeared around 380 BC).

The Allegory of the Cave 

Plato imagines a group of people who have lived chained in a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of the cave entrance, and begin to ascribe forms to these shadows. According to Plato, the shadows are as close as the prisoners get to seeing reality. He then explains how the philosopher is like a prisoner who is freed from the cave and comes to understand that the shadows on the wall are not constitutive of reality at all, as he can perceive the true form of reality rather than the mere shadows seen by the prisoners.

The Allegory is related to Plato's Theory of Forms, wherein Plato asserts that "Forms" (or "Ideas"), and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality. Only knowledge of the Forms constitutes real knowledge. In addition, the allegory of the cave is an attempt to explain the philosopher's place in society.

The Allegory of the Cave is related to Plato's metaphor of the sun (507b509c) and the analogy of the divided line (509d513e), which immediately precede it at the end of Book VI. Allegories are summarized in the viewpoint of dialectic at the end of Book VII and VIII (531d-534e). This relates to the idea of forms as people struggle to see the reality beyond illusion.




What is really impressive that 2500 years later and it is still relevant today.