He is ‘enlightened’ and comes back to the cave to awaken the others from the dream. He (the philosopher) now sees reality by means of the sunlight outside the cave rather than the shadow projections from the fire. He saw that his former reality is made up of only forms that are illusory and transient. The other important part has to do with the philosopher who, once free, could discover the reality outside the consensual reality, the Neo outside of The Matrix so to speak. We are still stuck in the cave of our consciousness.
This is what we take to be our solid reality but we cannot see how reality is actually so illusory and shadowy because, like the prisoners, we have never seen the world outside. The shadows on the wall are a metaphor for our consensual reality-the shared fears, illusions, beliefs, perceptions, values, and judgments. This is what we can call consensual reality, or to use a more fancy word, the social matrix. At the heart of the allegory is the idea that we are seeing and interpreting life through a very narrow part of our consciousness (the cave) and so what we are seeing are only mere shadow forms of reality.Īll the prisoners share the same reality: the shadows on the wall. The allegory has, of course, much resonance with real life and is so timeless in its power and applicability. Soon he quickly became labelled as delusional, cranky and out of his mind. He went back to explain this revelation to the ones still imprisoned in the cave but they could not fathom what he was talking about. He quickly realised that what he and his inmates were seeing was only a mere shadow of reality, distorted forms dancing on a wall.
#Allegory of the cave explained free#
He then mentions how the philosopher (according to Plato) is like that prisoner who was set free and went to the world outside the cave. The dancing shadows were their only reality and they gave names and labeled the different shadow forms. The only thing they could see were shadows being cast on the wall in front of them by objects moving in front of a fire behind them. The prisoners were chained to a wall inside the cave all their lives. One of the most famous and timeless allegory in Plato’s work is the allegory of the cave which goes something along these lines:Ī group of people were living as prisoners inside a cave. This philosophical style was called ‘midwifery’ because the role of the philosopher was to assist the other in giving birth to an idea or point of view without forcing it or imposing one’s point of view.Īnother very important hallmark in Plato’s work was his brilliant use of allegories, typically stories that reveal a hidden and profound meaning.Īllegories can be very powerful tools to bring forward a realization.
This dialogue style would normally entail a philosopher, for example Socrates, asking questions to another and through his questions he would make the other come to the conclusion or ‘a-ha moment’ by himself instead of lecturing or pontificating to him. All of Plato’s works were in fact called dialectical, meaning that instead of talking about an idea he wanted to convey, he would write about two people, usually two known figures of the time, in dialogue, arguing and debating two different points of view. Intellectuals were taking public debate and oratory quite seriously at the time.Īs was the style in those days, especially in Plato’s own works, dialogue and argumentation were at the forefront of the whole spectacle. It’s around 347B.C and the political and philosophical climate is quite fervent. Plato was definitely one of them as was Socrates before him and Aristotle after him, a lineage of master and student that left a legacy in western philosophical thinking for centuries beyond. They all have different reasons for being there but one thing stands in common, they want to hear the wisest and most brilliant minds of the time speak. It’s an early evening in Athens and a small crowd of contemporary free thinkers, philosophers, skeptics, cynics, intellectuals, and rebels of the time gather around for a sitting at the academy.
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