Plato's Cave

[EchelonHunt]

'The Allegory of The Cave' by Plato: Summary and Meaning 

"Imagine a cave, in which there are three prisoners. The prisoners are tied to some rocks, their arms and legs are bound and their head is tied so that they cannot look at anything but the stonewall in front of them.
These prisoners have been here since birth and have never seen outside of the cave.
Behind the prisoners is a fire, and between them is a raised walkway.
People outside the cave walk along this walkway carrying things on their head including; animals, plants, wood and stone.

So, imagine that you are one of the prisoners. You cannot look at anything behind or to the side of you – you must look at the wall in front of you.
When people walk along the walkway, you can see shadows of the objects they are carrying cast on to the wall.
If you had never seen the real objects ever before, you would believe that the shadows of objects were ‘real.’

Plato suggests that the prisoners would begin a ‘game’ of guessing which shadow would appear next.
If one of the prisoners were to correctly guess, the others would praise him as clever and say that he were a master of nature.

One of the prisoners then escapes from their bindings and leaves the cave.
He is shocked at the world he discovers outside the cave and does not believe it can be real.
As he becomes used to his new surroundings, he realizes that his former view of reality was wrong.
He begins to understand his new world, and sees that the Sun is the source of life and goes on an intellectual journey where he discovers beauty and meaning
He see’s that his former life, and the guessing game they played is useless.

The prisoner returns to the cave, to inform the other prisoners of his findings.
They do not believe him and threaten to kill him if he tries to set them free."

The Allegory of the cave by Plato should not be taken at face value. In essays and exams, whoever is marking it expects you to have a deeper understanding of the meaning of the theory. You can then use these to think about criticisms and then to form your own opinion.

In Plato’s theory, the cave represents people who believe that knowledge comes from what we see and hear in the world – empirical evidence. The cave shows that believers of empirical knowledge are trapped in a ‘cave’ of misunderstanding.

The Shadows represent the perceptions of those who believe empirical evidence ensures knowledge. If you believe that what you see should be taken as truth, then you are merely seeing a shadow of the truth. In Plato’s opinion you are a ‘pleb’ if you believe this (their insult for those who are not Philosophers)!

The Game represents how people believe that one person can be a ‘master’ when they have knowledge of the empirical world. Plato is demonstrating that this master does not actually know any truth, and suggesting that it is ridiculous to admire someone like this.

The escaped prisoner represents the Philosopher, who seeks knowledge outside of the cave and outside of the senses.
The Sun represents philosophical truth and knowledge
His intellectual journey represents a philosophers journey when finding truth and wisdom

The other prisoners reaction to the escapee returning represents that people are scared of knowing philosophical truths and do not trust philosophers.

Source: 'The Allegory of The Cave' by Plato: Summary and Meaning

The cave is society or the gender binary.

The shadows of reality are the stereotypes, the rules and standards that dictate what male and females should act.

The prisoners are the folks who believe there is only male or female in terms of gender.

The escaped prisoner is the person who has realised the prisoner's truth of the gender binary is a lie (e.g. that gender isn't just black or white, that there is more genders out there than just male and female.)

Plato's Cave is also used in The Matrix which comes as no surprise, given the themes the film explores,

Just as the prisoners in the cave, Neo is chained to massive wall where machines harvest his body’s heat to power themselves. Neither the prisoners nor the people in the matrix realize that they are prisoners; they are completely unaware the reality they think they know is false. While explaining the matrix, Morpheus says to Neo, “…you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Born into a prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison for your mind.” “The Matrix” adapts the dark cave, where prisoners are literally chained, to become one of a virtual state, where people are not physically bound, but mentally, furthering their belief that they are free though they are not. This prevents them from doing anything about their imprisonment.

Source: The Matrix: A Complex Modern Adaption of Plato's Allegory of The Cave

I think it's all very interesting, how many similarities there are from Plato's Cave and The Matrix to our reality in this society as it exists today.

Feel free to discuss to your heart's content!

[Ativan Prescribed]

At one time I thought of the forest as being in between the two cities of binary.
Off to the side was the transition highway between the cities.
The forest was just a place, like the cities, the forest was made up of paths that the NB people used.
It didn't take very long to realize that the cities are places inside of a much larger forest.
That transition highway is still there, it exists, but the cities are surrounded by a forest of identities.
Just like the cities have their identities.
A single forest between the two cities isn't big enough or even capable of holding all of the identities that there could be.
NB has it's place in the overall forest as well as many others, I'm sure.
But the cities do exist as they always have, just like the forest has always existed.
It was in discovering the forest as much more of an entirety that I came to understand identities.
Not that I understand each and every one, I understand there are many more than a person could know.
I do know that NB identities don't live along the transition Highway, but are everywhere I know of in this huge forest of identities.
I know the cities exist as they are, overpopulated and many never travel outside of the cities.
Many feel they can dictate what the paths and where identities are, because some of them looked over at the forest as they traveled the Transition Highway.
Rarely do any of them actually stop and get off the highway and discover the identities that live in this vast forest that has many paths to walk on.
The cities are cis, and they have no real conception of just how big the forest actually is.
The ones who travel the highway see a part of it, but have no real idea of how vast it actually is.
Only the very few who venture off that highway or out of the cities and discover that they belong in the forest, know the vastness of identities that are there.
They discover the multitudes of identities who have always been there.