Plato Allegory of the Cave- Chia Zhen Yan

Chia Zhen Yan 1002831

In the cave, the prisoners mistake appearance for reality. They 
believe that the images they are seeing on the wall are actually real, 
they do not know that there are objects making these images.


In the allegory, Plato likens people untutored in the Theory of Forms to prisoners chained in a cave, 
unable to turn their heads. All they can see is the wall of the cave. Behind them burns a fire.  Between the 
fire and the prisoners there is a parapet, along which puppeteers can walk. The puppeteers, who are behind the 
prisoners, hold up puppets that cast shadows on the wall of the cave. The prisoners are unable to see these puppets, 
the real objects, that pass behind them. What the prisoners see and hear are shadows and echoes cast 
by objects that they do not see. Here is an illustration of Plato’s Cave:


The prisoners can turn their heads and see real objects when released, They will realize what are the errors but can we seeing the causes of shadows and analogous? 
We can grasp the forms of our minds.


According to “Plato’s aim in the Republic is to describe what is necessary for us to achieve this reflective understanding.” 
I think that our ability thinking will depend on the forms. The objects that we participate it.


The prisoners may learn what a book is by their experience with shadows of books. But they would be mistaken 
if they thought that the word “book” refers to something that any of them has ever seen.
Likewise, we may acquire concepts by our perceptual experience of physical objects. But we would be mistaken 
if we thought that the concepts that we grasp were on the same level as the things we perceive.


In my opinion, the plato brings the meaning of each person
has his own ability to think.  According to "Plato’s point: the general terms of our 
language are not “names” of the physical 
objects that we can see. They are actually names of things 
that we cannot see, things that we can only grasp with the mind." So I think that Whenever our heart is bound by the fetters of
emotions, it is unable to delibarate its own intelligence to maintain the things.