Reality and Knowledge in Plato's Myth of the Cave - Essay Example

?Reality and Knowledge in Plato’s Myth of the Cave It is said that philosophy is a foot to Plato, because this great philosopher was the first tomake a distinction between reality and the world of ideas in our minds that became one of the primary contributions to philosophic science. Each and every philosopher has started his philosophical exploration and experiences from Plato’s ideas. Besides, his ideas are not simply a beginning of philosophic development, but a starting point of the ongoing philosophic dispute which started many centuries ago. Therefore, analyzing philosophic ideas of the rationalists and empiricists, dualists and monists, idealists, materialists and pragmatists begins with perception or rejection of Plato’s ideas of reality and knowledge. The expression that philosophy is a footnote to Plato does not necessarily mean that the philosophers continue Platonic traditions or agree with Plato’s ideas. However, in my opinion, it is Plato who we think of first when we start dealing with philosophic issues. The tendency to incline to the ideas regarding the nature of knowledge and reality can be found in thinking of many European philosophers. Furthermore, it would be wrong to associate every philosopher with Plato, as there are many great thinkers whose ideas were not based on Plato’s teaching or are contrary with them. Of course, Plato is one of the greatest philosophers standing in line with Aristotle, Socrates, Hume, Locke, and Kant. Nevertheless, power of Plato’s thought like nobody else’s is so great that his ideas can be traced in others thinkers’ philosophy, especially when to speak about European philosophy. Intellectual tradition started by Plato has never ceased to prosper. Europeans are the first and the most frequently said to be referring to Plato’s philosophy, because his thinking seems to be the closest to this particular group of people. The meaning of the statement that philosophy is a footnote to Plato is nothing else, but a metaphor which means that power of his thinking can be neither denied nor rejected, because it has been interwoven into the philosophical tradition of many other great philosophers. Therefore, today it is difficult to discern the ideas regarding, for example, knowledge and reality and classify them into Platonic and non-Platonic. It is difficult to say exactly which philosopher was influenced by Plato and which was not. My understanding of knowledge and reality is that reality is limited to the point what we can comprehend and see on basis of our senses usage. To put it simply, if we see a beggar on the street, we conclude him to be a poor and miserable man because of his real physical appearance. However, this person can be a great thinker the same as the worst conman, but we do not know as our knowledge is limited by what we can only see on the surface. The knowledge about this man as well as about different things in the world is hidden. We can discover the knowledge only when we strive for such discovery and keep searching even at times it seems pointless. I agree with Plato that people must try to rise above their limited knowledge to learn more and to attain the highest form of knowledge. At the same time, I think that one type of knowledge can be perceived and explained differently as we have ability to compare things. Our experiences and knowledge of something is relative: for example, if we’ve tried a very delicious cake, we tend to think it’s best in the world. But when we continue tasting more and more delicious cakes, we understand that the first one was not the best one. The same can be claimed about anything which exists in reality. Besides, I’d like to conclude that real knowledge and true wisdom comes with life-long learning. To start, the allegory of the cave also referred to as Plato’s Myth of the Cave is the allegory used by the Greek Philosopher Plato in his work The Republic. Plato basically uses this allegory to illustrate the nature and wanting of education. He describes the interacting phenomena of knowledge and reality and explains that people often spend their lives without seeking reality because their limitations compel those to remain, sticking to limited knowledge and perceptions. It is the fictional conversation between Plato’s teacher Socrates and his brother in which Socrates talks about a group of people restrained to the wall of a cave where they spend their entire lives just facing the blank wall. When the things are passing by the fire behind them on the other side, the prisoners of the cave see their shadows on the wall and describe forms to these shadows. These shadows became a source of knowing reality to the prisoners (Velasquez 5). Furthermore, Socrates explains that a philosopher is like a prisoner freed from the cave. He got the sense to realize that the shadows are not reality and he can go beyond the shadows because he is no longer bounded to view only the shadows or reflection of the things. The story of the prisoners was told basically to illustrate that philosophers have the potential and chance to explore the things to find the reality rather making the pictures on the basis of the shadows. The philosophers could perceive the true form of reality because they are not bound to a wall and the shadows passing by. It implies that the vision of the individual is broadened when he is exposed to a broader landscape of knowledge. A person becomes able to distinguish between reality and imagination when he acquires complete knowledge about some particular object or phenomenon. Through this allegory, Plato explains that people tend to believe in the reality they are exposed to. Moreover, they mistakenly think it is the only true reality because they don’t know that there is a world beyond their knowledge. The things they see seem real to them because they think that the world is only what they can see in their lives. However, the reality is different from the knowledge, because in reality the people have access to limited amount of information and like the prisoners of the cave they think that reality is direct to their limited knowledge. Furthermore, when Plato describes Socrates dialogue, talking about a prisoner who was freed from the cave, he actually illustrates the situation when people become aware of reality and come to know that the knowledge that they possessed about certain things was neither complete nor true. In a word, their reality is very limited, while the world of knowledge is a mind that can be open for exploration is extremely wide. Plato explains the relationship between reality and true knowledge: I say, now, that the prison is the world we see with our eyes; the light of the fire is like the power of our sun. The climb upward out of the cave into the upper world is the ascent of the mind into the domain if true knowledge (Velasquez 6). Furthermore, some people freed from the prison desire to come back to their cave, because they prefer limited reality to the boundless world of knowledge. However, Plato’s cave also describes the situation when the prisoner is taken back to the cave. He explains that the man will no longer feel happy going back to the dark place and will disdain the honor and praise of the other prisoner who guesses the next shadow. In the same way, his fellow prisoners will also become angry with him, because they will feel that after going up out of the cave that person has changed. Consequently they will have the desire to kill that person as well as the one who released him (Heidegger and Sadler 21). In this interesting allegory, Plato’s the cave conveys very strong and important message about knowledge and reality. In this allegory the limited view of the world has been compared to the physical perceptions of mankind. The allegory proposes the conception that the true reality of the world is much more than what people generally perceive. The role of the philosopher has been beautifully identified in this allegory in which Plato suggests that a philosopher has the role to investigate the highest meaning of enlightenment, and thus, the true meaning of philosophy is achievement of freedom from assumptions that enables freedom of beliefs (Velasquez 30). In a broader sense, the cave depicts the limited senses of humans that points out at a very limited vision of reality, but they regard their knowledge as real and remain unaware of the fact that reality is much more from what they think. Plato suggests that in order to get closer to reality one must break the chains or limits that are bounding his thoughts and perceptions. After getting free from the limitations, one has to look around to observe the things occurring around him to understand the process through which little knowledge or reflection of the objects was transmitted to him. Once he understands the process, he will be able to realize that reality is far beyond his imagination and having knowledge will show him that there is a wide and bright world which he has to explore further to attain true knowledge. As one can imagine, the allegory of the cave has been discussed and reviewed from many different standpoints. It is widely believed that Plato’s Myth of the Cave contains a very important message about the dynamics of exploring reality through true knowledge of attaining. There are different schools of thoughts that agree with Plato’s allegory of cave whereas some of them disagree with it and find it opposite to their philosophy. The meanings of the cave allegory have been perceived differently by the rationalists and empiricists, dualists and monists, idealists, materialists and pragmatists. In fact, the allegory denigrates the material world and sets forth the idea that the ideas of forms are superior to the material world and, thus, it is imperative to escape from the cave to explore the world and seek true knowledge in life. This stance has been criticized by the materialists because they believe that Plato basically divided the world in two parts, where people have to make clear choice between the two without the possibility of survival at the intersection of both. Also, the dualists highly appreciate Plato’s idea, because they believe in the superiority of the nonphysical elements. Besides, they agree that the body and the mind are different things. The prisoners in chains were also illustrated as idea of dualism by Plato. He asserts that mind and body are two different things, but the body has to be freed to make the mind free and able to explore the world. The dualists agree with Plato and affirm that the mind and the body are distinct. In addition, their relation determines the ways to explore reality. Also, the allegory of the cave illustrates empirical dualism. Plato’s prisoners represent empirical perspective by exhibiting limited nature of dualism and, thus, this approach is appreciated by the empirical dualistic people. Plato's cave has been set in an ideal state. It goes along with the idealistic approach by describing that the people like to live in the manageable and comfortable environment where they get occasional and fleeting glimpses of ultimate reality. The pragmatists, however, disagree with the allegory of the cave because they believe in the development of theory, while a broad vision of the mind is irrespective of physical boundaries. Monists disagree with the cave allegory because contrary to Plato’s preposition, they believe that the universe and God is one unity and, hence, there is no possibility of existence of two different worlds where people live in different conditions or realities. In my personal opinion, the allegory of the cave conveys a very convincing and deep message that has serious implications in real life of every individual. I believe that like the prisoners, we also live with limited vision and limited thought due to our blind understanding of the world. We will never reach a high level of understanding and knowledge unless we can learn to break our boundaries and limits. The allegory poses a great question that we all have to think about: what is our real position in the world? In conclusion, we have to realize that we all start with limited knowledge and vision due to the fact that we have developed a narrow set of information and knowledge about the world. To get ourselves free from the cave it is imperative to get rid of the chains that are binding us, and after attaining freedom, we have to prepare our minds to initiate the journey of exploring the world of broad knowledge. Plato’s allegory of the cave appears to be very interesting and compelling, because it motivates individuals to go beyond their limitations and spend life exploring new horizons of knowledge and experiences. Work Cited Heidegger, Martin & Ted Sadler. The essence of truth: on Plato's cave allegory and Theaetetus. Continuum International Publishing Group: 2002. Print. Velasquez, Manuel. Philosophy: A Text with Readings, 11th Edition. Boston: Clark Baxter, 2011, 2008. Print. Assignment: It is said that all philosophy is a footnote to Plato. Explain what Plato is trying to say about reality and our knowledge of it in the “Myth of the Cave.” Explain in what ways the rationalists and empiricists, dualists and monists, idealists, materialists and pragmatists would agree or disagree with Plato. Explain your own position about knowledge and reality. Grade: D= 70%. Instructors comment; you really did not write about the assignment except to discuss what you think Plato's allegory of the cave is about. So I have given you credit for attempting to discuss that. But even so, you do not demonstrate a very clear understanding of Plato. Read More