Plato's cave myth: summary, analysis and meaning of the allegory

Plato's Cave Myth is an allegory about the reality of our knowledge. Plato creates the myth of the cave to show in a figurative sense that we are chained within a cavern, since we are born, and how the shadows that we see reflected on the wall make up what we consider real.

Plato (428 a. from C.-347 a. de C.) also uses this allegory to explain how it is for the philosopher and teacher to guide people to knowledge (education), trying to free them from the bonds of the reality of the cave. According to this philosopher, people become comfortable in their ignorance and can oppose, even violently, those who try to help them change.

The myth of the cave is found in book VII of the work Republic of Plato, written towards the year 380 a. by C. The general importance of the work Republic lies in the exposition of concepts and theories that lead us to questions about the origin knowledge, the problem of the representation of things and the nature of reality itself.

Summary of Plato's Cave Myth

In the myth of the cave is a dialogue written by Plato, in which his teacher Socrates and his brother Glaucón talk about how knowledge and philosophical education affect society and people. individuals.

In this dialogue, Socrates asks Glaucón to imagine a group of prisoners who have been chained from their childhood behind a wall, inside a cave. There, a fire lights up the other side of the wall, and the prisoners see the shadows cast by objects that are on this wall, which are manipulated by other people who pass by behind.

Socrates tells Glaucon that the prisoners believe that what they observe is the real world, without realizing that they are only the appearances of the shadows of those objects.

Later, one of the prisoners manages to free himself from his chains and begins to ascend. He observes the light of the fire beyond the wall, whose brightness blinds him and almost makes him return to darkness.

Little by little, the liberated man gets used to the firelight and, with some difficulty, decides to move forward. Socrates proposes that this is a first step in acquiring knowledge. Afterwards, the man goes outside, where he first observes the reflections and shadows of things and people, and then sees them directly.

Finally, man looks at the stars, the moon, and the sun. Socrates suggests that the man here reasons in such a way that he conceives of this external world (world of ideas), as a superior world. The man then returns to share this with the prisoners in the cave, as he feels that he must help them ascend to the real world.

When he returns to the cave for the other prisoners, the man cannot see well, because he has become used to the outside light. The prisoners think that the trip has damaged him and do not want to accompany him outside. Plato, through Socrates, affirms that these prisoners would do everything possible to avoid this journey, even killing those who dared to try to free them.

Plato's Cave Myth Analysis

The myth of the cave is an allegory that encompasses several elements that the theory of ideas of Plato and an analysis divided into 3D:

• the anthropological dimension (Human nature),
• the ontological dimension (of being) and epistemological (of knowledge) and,
• the moral dimension (appreciation of society) and politics (way of governing).

Plato's theory of ideas is based on two opposing concepts:

• The sensible world, whose experience is lived through the senses. They are multiple, corruptible, and mutable.
• The intelligible world or the world of ideas, whose experience is harvested through knowledge, reality and the meaning of life. Being unique, eternal and immutable.

Anthropological dimension

In Plato, body and soul correspond to two different dimensions. On the one hand, the body is immersed in the sensible world, which is corruptible and changeable, while, on the other hand, the soul is linked to the world of ideas, which is perfect and immutable.

In the myth of the cave, the anthropological dimension refers to the condition of the human being, and the way of knowing about it. This dimension is represented in the nature of the prisoner and his body, his relationship with the cave (sensible world), as well as in the external world and the liberation of his soul (world of ideas).

The prisoners are a metaphor for people who are tied to their perceptions and the images presented to them. Shadows are the physical world that you perceive and that you believe is true knowledge. However, what they observe within is nothing more than subjective knowledge.

When one of the prisoners frees himself from his chains and leaves the cave, this journey represents his ascension to the intelligible world, where he acquires true knowledge.

This implies a moral and intellectual liberation of the soul from the bonds and limitations offered by the sensible world. His ascent from inside the cave is a metaphor for his passage from ignorance to the world of ideas. This step, according to Plato, can be done with the practice of the dialectical method.

Furthermore, this ascension into the world of ideas is a search for self-knowledge in the external world (as expressed in the phrase "know yourself").

Ontological and epistemological dimension

The ontological dimension refers to the nature of being and the epistemological dimension refers to the nature, origin and validity of knowledge.

Each element of the myth of the cave symbolizes a level of being and knowledge, within Plato's ontological and epistemological dualism. Precisely, the allegory of the men imprisoned inside a cave (lower level) and of the man liberated on the outside (higher level), works to explain his dualistic conception of the world.

From the lower to the upper level we have:

Epistemological dimension	Ontological dimension
Sentient world (inside the cavern)	Opinion (doxa): Conjecture (eikasia): they are the shadows that the prisoners observe. Belief (pistis): all objects, including prisoners, inside the cavern.	Everything perceived as "real" inside the cave is nothing more than an image or reflection: Fire is a representation of the sun, and it reflects shadows. Statues and other objects.
World of Ideas (outside the cave)	True knowledge (episteme): Discursive knowledge (dianoia): the released prisoner observes reflections of things outside. Real intellectual knowledge (noesis): The released prisoner looks directly at the sun and outside objects.	They are all the objects that the released prisoner observes: Shadows and reflections on the outside are like mathematical thinking. The natural world and men represent ideas. The sun is the highest level, the idea of ​​Good.

Here, Plato's cave myth shows us the levels for the ascension to the intelligible world or the ascension of Being.

Moral and political dimension

For Plato, the world of ideas is where the soul of man finds knowledge. Since the released prisoner witnesses the ideal world, by ascending and experiencing the exterior of the cave, he feels the duty to share what he has experienced. Here the sun is a metaphor for the idea of ​​Good, which is the purest idea of ​​all.

The cave is the prison of appearance, of the purely sensible, of reflections and images, while the ideal world and the idea of ​​Good are true knowledge. The released prisoner, who is now like the philosopher, cannot continue with opinion-based knowledge (doxa) derived from perceptions.

The return of the released prisoner is an example of the philosopher helping others to achieve real knowledge. This has seen directly the sun (the Good) and is like a politician prepared to be the one who governs with justice. The democracy of the people, in Plato, is similar to what happens inside the cave, since people inhabit a sensible world and must be guided by the philosopher-politician or philosopher-king.

The fulfillment of the destiny of liberation requires dialectics or philosophy, but creates a conflict in relation to morality on this situation. The risk that the released prisoner runs is like the tragic end of Socrates, when he is sentenced to death by the Athenian court, for revolting the Athenian youth and not respecting the gods traditional. Is it viable to die for duty?

Theory of knowledge and the myth of the cave

In the RepublicIn chapters VI and VII (with the analogy or simile of the line and the allegory of the cave) Plato points out that the origin of real knowledge stems from ideas.

However, the physical world, visible or sensible, is a world of limited knowledge, of opinion. The myth of the cave expresses the underlying duality between apparent knowledge (inside the cave) and pure and real knowledge (outside the cave).

This translates into an epistemological and an ontological dualism:

• On the one hand, knowledge of the world of ideas, made up of intellectual knowledge and discursive knowledge.
• On the other hand, the knowledge of the sensible world, based on opinion, and which is composed of conjecture and belief.

Plato's epistemology (his conception of him about knowledge) goes hand in hand with his ontology (the real being of things), being that everything found in the physical world is a copy of an immaterial idea, found in the world of ideas

True knowledge

The world of ideas is a world of absolutes that are immutable and that are the essences of things in the physical world and it is through reason that this knowledge can be accessed.

The knowledge that belongs to the world of ideas is a true and scientific knowledge (episteme), about what is real, and is composed of discursive knowledge or dianoia, and properly intellectual knowledge or noesis:

• Discursive knowledge (dianoia): it is related to logical and mathematical reasoning, representing itself in objects (for example, geometric figures).
• Intellectual knowledge (noesis): refers to reason, its objects being ideas, of an immutable nature and it is not possible to find it in the sensible world. This knowledge has as its maximum object the idea of ​​Good.

Outside the cavern, the released prisoner observes the reflections of things, which Plato uses as a metaphor for mathematical or discursive knowledge.

Knowledge proper, which is of ideas, with the idea of ​​the Good as the most important, is obtained through the use of reason. The soul has access to this through memory, since it was once part of this world of ideas.

Sensitive knowledge

As for the sensible world, this is a world that is in constant flux. This makes it impossible for this to be the source of knowledge in a universal sense.

The sensible world offers a type of knowledge that is based on physical objects and on images and appearances. This makes it no more than an individual knowledge, in which the visible objects offer no more than an understanding of reality based on opinion or doxa, so it is a subjective knowledge.

Plato considers that this type of knowledge is divided into two parts: conjecture or eikasia and belief or pistis.

The conjecture (eikasia) is based on imagination and assumption, its objects being images with a fleeting quality, and it is present in visible reality.

For example, in the myth of the cave, Plato suggests that reflections and shadows, and other types of images, offer immediate insight that shapes our perspective and beliefs about the world. But such knowledge is fleeting and not about the essences of things.

In the case of belief (pistis), this is based on observation, its objects being those material things that are in visible reality. Furthermore, its nature is transitory (its objects are changeable and corruptible), although not as fleeting as in the case of conjecture.

Here, the objects that are experienced, like the body itself, are physical and corruptible objects.

See also All about Plato: biography, contributions and works of the Greek philosopher.

The myth of the cave and education

In the myth of the cave, it allows us to explore Plato's vision of both knowledge and education.

Since real knowledge is different from knowledge of the apparent world, and also the ascent to the world of ideas allows the philosopher to see what is true, Plato assumes that the education of those who remain in the cave is the responsibility of this.

In the myth of the cave, the prisoner who ascends to the outside world, passes from darkness to light, from ignorance to knowledge. The prisoners who remain inside are a metaphor for the condition of people in society.

This is key in Plato and this allegory, the fact that people begin life in the cave, as a symbol of a world of appearances. Education, for this philosopher, is not about discovering or providing knowledge, but about a journey towards this. Learning is difficult, since one has to abandon the assumptions that were previously had, when living in the shadows of the cave, in order to have critical thinking.

Here, the allegory of the cave is a way of understanding what the teacher-philosopher does, in the same way as in the moral and political dimension, as a call to guide those who remain prisoners of the world of appearance.

For the released prisoner, his role as a philosopher and teacher is complicated. Helping other prisoners to move to the outside world (educating) is difficult, because it is not easy to abandon the way they observe the world of the senses, inside the cave.

Education implies action and transformation, the student is not passive, just as the prisoner struggles to reach the outside and later tries to guide the other prisoners. Knowledge is not deposited within the disciple, but rather is helped to discover it within his own soul.

Knowledge and learning

In Plato, knowing is linked to access to the world of ideas. The soul already knows, because there is no knowledge that starts from nowhere, and what happens is that it simply does not remember it. According to him, there are several ways to acquire knowledge.

First, through reminiscence (remembering) past lives. For Plato, the soul of the human being transcends, from the world of ideas to the physical world. Souls transmigrate, and the human soul already knows what was in the world of ideas.

Second, the proper method of accessing knowledge is that of dialectics. Since knowledge is a knowledge of the essences, through dialectics you can access what was already known (reminiscence) and that comes from the world of ideas.

Socrates, as stated in Plato's dialogues (for example, in the Theaetetus), uses irony and maieutics as exercises to help a person achieve knowledge.

Irony is the exercise of asking questions to expose a person's lack of knowledge, who believes that he already knows something about a certain matter, only to realize later that it is not So. This can be summed up in the famous expression "I only know that I know nothing".

Maieutics consists of the practice of helping to give birth, as a midwife would. However, in Socrates, this is about helping a disciple to reach the knowledge that he already has within himself. Since the soul is immortal and possesses knowledge, remembering is a way of knowing.

The way in which irony and maieutics were used by Socrates was a form of question-based dialectics. A person was questioned about an issue, his response was debated, new questions were asked, and a clearer definition of that issue was reached.

The theme of the myth of the cave in literature and cinema

The theme of self-deception has been explored in various literary and cinematographic works throughout history, particularly in recent decades. Here are some examples:

• The life is dream by Calderón de la Barca.
• A happy world by Aldous Huxley
• The movie They Live (They are alive or Survive) by John Carpenter.
• The movie Dark city (City in darkness) by Alex Proyas.
• The movie Open your eyess by Alejandro Amenábar.
• The movie The Truman Show (The Truman Show: Story of a Life) by Peter Weir.
• First film of the trilogy Matrixby Lana and Lily Wachowsky.
• The cavernby José Saramago.

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