~The Allegory of the Cave~ (Final Essay)

Describe the Allegory of the Cave by Plato and its representation and significance in Western Philosophy.

Philosophy is a limitless subject, uncontrolled by various divisions of thought. It provokes feelings of confusion and imagery of old bearded men scratching there heads. It brings about reasoning that could be considered unreasonable to some and are explained through different conventions such as an allegory. Plato’s most famous allegory, the Allegory of the Cave, is one that is a metaphorical representation of Plato’s thoughts on the people’s ignorance to reality and the value of true human knowledge.

Since their birth a group of people have been living in an underground cave. They are bound by ropes at the hands and feet and are unable to turn around. They face a wall that has shadows cast on it by a fire positioned behind them. The shadows that appear on the wall are from objects passing in front of the fire. We assume these people are able to speak because they can identify the similar shapes on the wall and the names given to them. These people have never known a different environment, because they have grown up in the cave since birth and they consider these shadows to be reality.
One day a man in the cave escapes into the real world, it is beautiful and he is, understandably, confused by this new reality. Although, soon after he is able to identify the shapes that had appeared on the wall as actual objects with dimension and colour. Greatly inclined by his discovery he goes back to the cave to alert the people of his findings. They don’t what to believe that they have been wrong all these years, are disrupted by his enthusiasm and decide to kill him.

An Allegory is a symbolic metaphor that puts an idea into pictures to portray or explain the inference to a perplexed audience. In this case, the adapted version of Plato’s Cave theory taken from his work ‘The Republic’, then selected through a range of sources like the novel ‘Sophie’s World’ by Jostein Gaardar and ‘The Philosophy Podcast’ spoken by Prof. Colin McGinn. Plato has used a descriptive allegory to convey his thoughts on how people don’t seem to favour going further into the realms of knowledge because of apprehensive attitudes towards change. The people in the cave are content with the continuity of their “reality” in the cave. The shadows that bounce onto the wall are real and there is nothing further to their appearance. Plato is questioning why people don’t query the existence of these objects or illusions, but just have this nonchalant acceptance of everything. It isn’t questioned why or how these black forms appear on the cave wall.

In the podcast, Prof. McGinn explains the idea that how can we know that the knowledge we already attain is true and how can we justify these assumptions. How can the people in the cave be so bold as to kill the man who went out of cave and made this discovery of the true nature of the shadows that appeared on the wall. They were living on the assumption that the forms on the wall were no more than that. It’s hard to believe that these people were so primitive in their thinking that didn’t even want to know how they appeared on the wall. Plato came up with this allegory to represent the difference between a philosopher and a common person of the time and contrast the ways in which they think and to what extent. It also brings forward the concern whether or not what we know is truth.


The allegory of the cave is contained in Plato’s most famous works ‘The Republic’ which was written in 360BC, 39 years after the death of Socrates. It was seen as a representative of the ill treatment of Socrates, his fight to inform people of the philosophical side of reason, the people in the western culture didn’t want to acccept his theories. It suggests Plato’s ideas that a philosopher’s power can have a negative or positive influence on the small minded nature of people who just didn’t want to have to change or except anything new. ‘The Republic’ also discusses further matters of what is justice and has greatly influenced the development of political and philosophical theories.

Philosophy is constantly questioning the state of existence, Plato was concerned with the metaphysical side of thought, the reality in which humans lived or didn’t live and how can we justify this existence. The cyclical nature of his thought leads into the philosophical division of skepticism which is still relevant in today’s society in philosophy, it is the doubting of what is true knowledge. His rationalist theories, of knowledge being the justification of assumptions could arguable be the basis of most philosophical understanding.

Along with his teacher Socrates, and his pupil Aristotle, Plato was acknowledged to have distinguished the foundations of philosophy. They were searching for what is referred to as ‘absolute truth’, which is conventionally a western philosophical characteristic. Although they may have been unable to find this ‘absolute truth’ Plato contributed greatly to western philosophy and the Allegory of the Cave still stands as a theory of well developed thought.

By Abbey Brettoner

Bibliography:
-‘Sophie’s World’ by Jostein Gaadar
-‘The Philosophy Podcast’ spoken by Prof. Colin McGinn
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_Cave
- http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/allegory.html