Friday, 31 August 2012

Plato's Allegory of the cave_Kang Chai Yuen 1106576

 
The Allegory of the Cave, also known as the Analogy of the Cave, is an allegory used by the Greek philosopher Plato in his work The Republic to illustrate "our nature in its education and want of education".
 
There are a group of people who lived all of their lives in a cave like a prisoner. The cave has a long channel go through to the ouside. Their necks and feet are chained and they can't look around but facing the blank wall. Behind them there is a fire in the combustion. Some people are holding objects passing in front of the fire behind them. The people see the shadows cast on the wall in front of them. They can't look back so they do not know the reason of the image, they think that those shadows is real, so they use different names to call them and they get used to this kind of life. One day, when a prisoner occasionally to break free of the shackles, he looking back to the fire, he realizes the images he had seen before rather than physical. When he contnues to walk out of the hole, his eyes were stimulated by the sun, as a result, he can't see anything. He had to go back to the cave, but he regret. He hated to see through anything because it brought him more pain.
 
After reading this allegory, I know that Plato wants to tell us, of course, truth and justice is hard to find but we cannot give up. The prisoner is certainly contrary to justice, but when the justice itself is a kind of nihilism, itself is a distant which difficult to reach, how can we easily give up the side we have? Therefore, the important is not the other side but is pursuit itself. Besides, back to the cave is not terrible, terrible is when we clearly understand the reality outside of the cave and then back to the cave.
  
Plato's Allegory of the Cave and the Matrix relate to each other because both involve prisoners in their own world. Society is controlled by the thinking that others have laid before them. Looking through the reality and truth are difficult and painful. Sometimes, there is dilemma in our life. In Plato's Allegory of the cave, the prisoner wanted to walk out from the cave but when he realize the reality outside the cave, he shrink back. In the Matrix,  everything Neo thought he had come to know and believe what was real it was astually wiped away.
 


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