Plato’s Shadows Work Like Film Projector, Film We See as Reality

“Imagine prisoners who have been chained since childhood deep

inside a cave. Not only are their limbs immobilized by the chains,
their heads are chained as well so that their eyes are fixed on a
wall. Behind the prisoners is an enormous fire, and between the
fire and the prisoners there is a raised walkway, along which
shapes of various animals, plants, and other things are carried.
The shapes cast shadows on the wall, which occupy the
prisoners’ attention. Also, when one of the shape-carriers speaks,
an echo against the wall causes the prisoners to believe that the
words come from the shadows. The prisoners engage in what
appears to us to be a game – naming the shapes as they come by.
This, however, is the only reality that they know, even though they
are seeing merely shadows of images..

“Suppose a prisoner is released and compelled to stand up and

turn around. His eyes will be blinded by the firelight, and the
shapes passing will appear less real than their shadows. Similarly,
if he is dragged up out of the cave into the sunlight, his eyes will
be so blinded that he will not be able to see anything. At first, he
will be able to see darker shapes such as shadows, and only
later brighter and brighter objects. The last object he would be
able to see is the sun, which, in time, he would learn to see as that
object which provides the seasons and the courses of the year,
presides over all things in the visible region, and is in some way
the cause of all these things that he has seen…..

“Once thus enlightened, so to speak, the freed prisoner would no

doubt want to return to the cave to free “his fellow bondsmen.”
The problem however is that they would not want to be freed:
descending back into the cave would require that the freed
prisoner’s eyes adjust again, and for a time, he would be inferior
at the ludicrous process of identifying shapes on the wall. This
would make his fellow prisoners murderous toward anyone who
attempted to free them.”
 Plato
Let us apply this allegory to modern life, for the sake of argument, and say that
the freed prisoner leaves the cave. Instead of a wall with shadows we have
television, instead of echoes we have radio. In the light the freed man realizes
that the broadcast media does not report the news but merely cast shadows to
entertain, deceive, or manipulate the shackled prisoners still in the cave….

For purposes of illustration, the cave described herein is the world, the
prisoners are those who erroneously perceive reality as being truthfully
reflected on television. And those who find the truth, those outside the cave,
know that they will be labeled fools, liars and agitators by those still casting the
shadows within the darkness of the cave. The shackled prisoners, unable to
verify the rescuer’s claim, will believe the very men oppressing them, and they
will attack the man who tries to save them.

These were men ranging from Martin Luther King Jr. to the Kennedys; anyone
who dared venture back into the cave of shadows in hopes of freeing the
shackled prisoners. It cannot be impressed deeply enough that those who seek
to keep you in the dark to “protect you” or “national security”, those who enforce
and defend undue secrecy in matters affecting the rights of all Americans, are
themselves in the darkness of the cave and will not suffer you to leave, because
only within it can they control you with deception; only within it can they induce
the fear, suspicion and hatred necessary for you to act against your interest,
and remain inside.

Plato’s classic Allegory of the Cave may best explain the true challenge of
disabusing the masses from the “shadows” on the cave wall which we are
taught from birth to perceive as real forms. These shadows are everything from
false or hateful political/religious ideologies to scientific racism; just about
anything that is bartered as truth and fact.

This is an age wherein the masses can ascend and leave the cave in numbers
unheard of, in real time. This is the age of the internet. Most of us can see this
as a good thing, that all of us are cells in the larger body of humanity. It is a
living, breathing body, the internet is the nervous system, and it has brought
this body to a new level of self-awareness like at no other time in history. All of
us matter. All of us must work to nurture and sustain it… and to treat anyone as
outside this body of humanity, or beneath it, is madness. All of us must ascend
and leave the cave of shadows, not just the elite, not just the lucky.

“There is no such thing, at this date of the world’s history, in

America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it.
There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions,
and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in
print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of
the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar
salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish
 as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for
another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one
issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would
be gone. The business of the journalists is to destroy the
truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of
mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily
bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this
toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals
of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they
pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and
our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual
prostitutes.”

John Swinton, New York Times Chief Editor 1880

There is, however, a powerful few who believe the masses must remain in
chains, in darkness. These are the “Masters” whom are themselves deceived
by shadows, and they will fight this ascension. Who are they? In America, it’s
the media companies, the blinkered puppeteers who manipulate and control
the public’s perception of “reality” for political or marketing objectives, never
knowing the actual form of truth because it is not known, sought or relevant to
their objective: money and control.

Once outside the cave, the masses will realize the darkness and shadows must
be abandoned in favor of the true forms. For those who grew rich on deception
and shadows, leaving the cave will be especially difficult. They will not leave it
themselves, nor will they suffer others to do so.

As media companies use their vast reserves of wealth and political connections
to move in and control the internet, they will fight that intellectual and spiritual
ascension of peoples that threatens their business model. They will
use censorship through false or spurious claims of copyright infringement;
attacking blogs, websites, social media, P2P and similar methods of
alternative information sharing; so often blocking information from those
outside the cave to those within it that one soon suspects it is intentional.
Similarly, they will use Digital Rights Management to control the information
that your pc can send to, and retrieve from the internet. In China, they will resort
to outright totalitarianism to keep the masses in the cave. When they say they
are following a US censorship model, they’re not straying too far from the truth.

However, what’s the point of discussing this allegory without including it in the
discussion?
The relevant excerpt from Plato’s The Republic:
Socrates: Behold! human beings living in a underground cave, which has a
mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the cave; here they have
been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they
cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains
from turning round their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a
distance, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you
will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which
marionette players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets.

Glaucon: I see..

Socrates: wall carrying all sorts of vessels, and statues and figures of animals
made of wood and stone and various materials, which appear over the wall?
Some of them are talking, others silent.

Glaucon: You have shown me a strange image, and they are strange
prisoners..

Socrates: their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire
throws on the opposite wall of the cave?

Glaucon: True, he said; how could they see anything but the shadows if they
were never allowed to move their heads?

Socrates: And of the objects which are being carried in like manner they would
only see the shadows?

Glaucon: Yes, he said..

Socrates: another, would they not suppose that they were naming what was
actually before them?

Glaucon: Very true.

Socrates: And suppose further that the prison had an echo which came from
the other side, would they not be sure to fancy when one of the passers-by
spoke that the voice which they heard came from the passing shadow?

Glaucon: No question, he replied..

Socrates: nothing but the shadows of the images.

Glaucon: That is certain.

Socrates: And now look again, and see what will naturally follow if the prisoners
are released and disabused of their error. At first, when any of them is liberated
and compelled suddenly to stand up and turn his neck round and walk and look
towards the light, he will suffer sharp pains; the glare will distress him, and he
will be unable to see the realities of which in his former state he had seen the
shadows; and then conceive some one saying to him, that what he saw before
was an illusion, but that now, when he is approaching nearer to being and his
eye is turned towards more real existence, he has a clearer vision, -what will be
his reply? And you may further imagine that his instructor is pointing to the
objects as they pass and requiring him to name them, -will he not be perplexed?
Will he not fancy that the shadows which he formerly saw are truer than the
objects which are now shown to him?

Glaucon: Far truer..

Socrates: light, will he not have a pain in his eyes which will make him turn away
to take and take in the objects of vision which he can see, and which he will
conceive to be in reality clearer than the things which are now being shown to
him?

Glaucon: True, he now.

Socrates: And suppose once more, that he is reluctantly dragged up a steep

and rugged ascent, and held fast until he’s forced into the presence of the sun
himself, is he not likely to be pained and irritated? When he approaches the
light his eyes will be dazzled, and he will not be able to see anything at all of
what are now called realities.

Glaucon: Not all in a moment, he said..

Socrates: sight of the upper world. And first he will see the shadows best, next
the reflections of men and other objects in the water, and then the objects
themselves; then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the
spangled heaven; and he will see the sky and the stars by night better than the
sun or the light of the sun by day?

Glaucon: Certainly.

Socrates: Last of he will be able to see the sun, and not mere reflections of him
in the water, but he will see him in his own proper place, and not in another; and
he will contemplate him as he is.
Glaucon: Certainly..

Socrates: He will then proceed to argue that this is he who gives the season
and the years, and is the guardian of all that is in the visible world, and in a
certain way the cause of all things which he and his fellows have been
accustomed to behold?

Glaucon: Clearly, he said, he would first see the sun and then reason about
him.

Socrates: And when he remembered his old habitation, and the wisdom of the
cave and his fellow-prisoners, do you not suppose that he would felicitate
himself on the change, and pity them?

Glaucon: Certainly, he would.

“The prison-house is the world of sight, the light of the fire is the sun, and
you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey upwards to be
the ascent of the soul into the intellectual world .. in the world of
knowledge the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an
effort; and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all
things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this
visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the
intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would act
 rationally, either in public or private life must have his eye fixed.”
Plato

Socrates: And if they were in the habit of conferring honors among themselves
on those who were quickest to observe the passing shadows and to remark
which of them went before, and which followed after, and which were together;
and who were therefore best able to draw conclusions as to the future, do you
think that he would care for such honors and glories, or envy the possessors of
them? Would he not say with Homer,

Better to be the poor servant of a poor master, and to endure anything, rather
than think as they do and live after their manner?

Glaucon: Yes, he said, I think that he would rather suffer anything than
entertain these false notions and live in this miserable manner.

Socrates: Imagine once more, I said, such an one coming suddenly out of the
sun to be replaced in his old situation; would he not be certain to have his eyes
full of darkness?

Glaucon: To be sure, he said.

Socrates: And if there were a contest, and he had to compete in measuring the
shadows with the prisoners who had never moved out of the cave, while his
sight was still weak, and before his eyes had become steady (and the time
which would be needed to acquire this new habit of sight might be very
considerable) would he not be ridiculous? Men would say of him that up he
went and down he came without his eyes; and that it was better not even to
think of ascending; and if any one tried to loose another and lead him up to the
light, let them only catch the offender, and they would put him to death.

Glaucon: No question, he said.

Socrates: This entire allegory, I said, you may now append, dear Glaucon, to
the previous argument; the prison-house is the world of sight, the light of the fire
is the sun, and you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey
upwards to be the ascent of the soul into the intellectual world according to my
poor belief, which, at your desire, I have expressed whether rightly or wrongly
God knows. But, whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of
knowledge the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort;
and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful
and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the
immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual; and that this is the
power upon which he who would act rationally, either in public or private life
must have his eye fixed.
Glaucon: I agree, he said, as far as I am able to understand you.

Socrates: Moreover, I said, you must not wonder that those who attain to this
beatific vision are unwilling to descend to human affairs; for their souls are ever
hastening into the upper world where they desire to dwell; which desire of theirs
is very natural, if our allegory may be trusted.

Glaucon: Yes, very natural.

Socrates: And is there anything surprising in one who passes from divine
contemplations to the evil state of man, misbehaving himself in a ridiculous
manner; if, while his eyes are blinking and before he has become accustomed
to the surrounding darkness, he is compelled to fight in courts of law, or in other
places, about the images or the shadows of images of justice, and is
endeavoring to meet the conceptions of those who have never yet seen
absolute justice?

Glaucon: Anything but surprising, he replied.

Socrates: Any one who has common sense will remember that the
bewilderments of the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either
from coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of the
mind’s eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye; and he who remembers this
when he sees any one whose vision is perplexed and weak, will not be too
ready to laugh; he will first ask whether that soul of man has come out of the
brighter light, and is unable to see because unaccustomed to the dark, or
having turned from darkness to the day is dazzled by excess of light. And he will
count the one happy in his condition and state of being, and he will pity the
other; or, if he have a mind to laugh at the soul which comes from below into the
light, there will be more reason in this than in the laugh which greets him who
returns from above out of the light into the cave.

Glaucon: That, he said, is a very just distinction.

Socrates: But then, if I am right, certain professors of education must be wrong

when they say that they can put a knowledge into the soul which was not there
before, like sight into blind eyes.

Glaucon: They undoubtedly say this, he replied.

Socrates: Whereas, our argument shows that the power and capacity of
learning exists in the soul already; and that just as the eye was unable to turn
from darkness to light without the whole body, so too the instrument of
knowledge can only by the movement of the whole soul be turned from the
world of becoming into that of being, and learn by degrees to endure the sight of
being, and of the brightest and best of being, or in other words, of the good.

Glaucon: Very true.

Socrates: And must there not be some art which will effect conversion in the
easiest and quickest manner; not implanting the faculty of sight, for that exists
already, but has been turned in the wrong direction, and is looking away from
the truth?

Glaucon: Yes, he said, such an art may be presumed.

Socrates: And whereas the other so-called virtues of the soul seem to be akin
to bodily qualities, for even when they are not originally innate they can be
implanted later by habit and exercise, the of wisdom more than anything else
contains a divine element which always remains, and by this conversion is
rendered useful and profitable; or, on the other hand, hurtful and useless. Did
you never observe the narrow intelligence flashing from the keen eye of a
clever rogue –how eager he is, how clearly his paltry soul sees the way to his
end; he is the reverse of blind, but his keen eyesight is forced into the service of
evil, and he is mischievous in proportion to his cleverness.

Glaucon: Very true, he said.

riginally appeared in Journal of Education 178/3, 1996.
Everyone knows that Plato is deeply interested in education. In one way or
another, nearly all of his dialogues are concerned with it -- what it can
accomplish and how it can accomplish it, who is qualified to impart and receive
it, why it is valuable, and so forth. My emphasis in this essay is on Plato's views
of education as they unfold in one extended passage in the Republic.[1] Here,
in a series of images and commentary on these images, Plato develops some
of the central points necessary to sustain the outlandish claim that
unless communities have philosophers as kings... or the people who are
currently called kings and rulers practice philosophy with enough
 integrity... there can be no end to political troubles... or even to human
troubles in general. (473C11-D5)
The right sort of ruler can only be produced by careful and systematic education,
as Plato continually reminds us (see, e.g., 487A7-8, 490C8-493A2, 497A3-D2,
502C9-504A1). Concern with this sort of education gives rise to the famous
images of the sun, the divided line, and the cave. Although I am primarily
concerned in this essay with the cave image and its educational implications,
occasionally this will require a look at the sun and the line and other contiguous
passages in the Republic. The analogy of the divided line is brought in to shed
light on the sun simile (509D1-5), which is itself introduced as a way of clarifying
the role of the good (508B12-C2). Plato himself insists that the cave image
must be "applied" to the discussion that leads up to it (517B1-2), and he
continues to draw out the implications of the cave image until quite late in Book
VII (see 532A1-533D4).
The Cave: Perception and Reality
The cave image is offered as "an analogy for the human condition -- for our
education or lack of it" (514A1-2). Imagine prisoners in a cave, chained and
unable to turn their heads; as a result they see only what is directly in front of
them. What they see are shadows cast by objects behind them which are
illuminated by firelight further behind and above them. The objects are carried
along and extend above a low wall behind the prisoners. The bearers of the
objects are hidden behind the wall and so cast no shadows; but occasionally
they speak, and the echoes of these words reach the prisoners and seem to
come from the shadows. The prisoners can talk among themselves, and they
naturally assume that the names they use apply to what they see and hear --
the shadows passing in front of them. Socrates offers a grim assessment of
their plight: "The shadows of artifacts constitute the only reality people in this
situation would recognize" (515C1-2).
As Glaucon observes, this is a weird image, and these are weird prisoners.
Nevertheless, Socrates says, they are like us (homoious hêmin, 515A5). Of
course we do not really spend our time chained and looking helplessly at
shadows produced by those intent on deceiving us. Yet for Plato something
about our condition makes the cave an apt image.
The prisoners see only shadows, and these shadows are cast by artifacts,
likenesses of animals and people (514B8-515C2). So the prisoners are, in
Plato's view, at least two removes from truth or reality, although they do not
realize this and would object if the suggestion were made to them (515C8-D7).
If they were freed and made to turn around towards the firelight, the prisoners
would be dazzled and unable to make out the objects that cast the shadows on
the wall (515C4-D1). If they were compelled to look directly at the fire, this
would hurt their eyes, and they'd probably prefer to go back to the comfortable
and familiar darkness of their prison (515E1-5). If they were forced out of the
cave entirely, out into the sunlight, this would be even more painful, and objects
outside the cave would be even harder for them to make out (515E7-516A3).
Gradually, however, their eyes would grow used to the light and they would
start to discern shadows, then reflections, then maybe even the objects
themselves (516A5-B2).
Plato tells us explicitly how to unpack some of the details of this image. First,
the cave is the region accessible to sight or perception (517B1-2). A few pages
earlier, in the sun simile, Plato distinguishes between the visible realm and the
intelligible realm, between things grasped by perception and things grasped by
reasoning or intelligence (507D8-509D4).[2] The visible realm comprises
ordinary perceptible things; the intelligible realm comprises what Plato calls the
forms or ideas.[3] The bound prisoner -- and by implication the ordinary
uneducated person -- has no access to intelligible forms. In fact, he has no idea
there are such things. Worse yet, his access is not to perceptible things
themselves, but only to shadows of those things. He may be exceedingly good
at identifying these shadows, better even than someone who has been freed
and has seen the artifacts responsible for casting the shadows and knows how
the shadows were cast (516C8-D7). Still, like the sight-lover Plato discusses
earlier in Book V (475D1-480A13), his epistemic horizons are limited.
Second, the world outside and above the cave is the intelligible region (517B4),
accessible not to perception but to reasoning. The objects here are more real or
true than the artifacts in the cave, since they are the originals of which the
artifacts are likenesses (515D1-7).[4]
Third, the upward journey out of the cave into daylight is the soul's ascent to the
intelligible realm (517B4-5). Having distinguished these realms earlier in the
sun simile and said something about their relations in the divided line analogy,
Plato now explicitly intimates that one can move from one realm to the other.
This is precisely the movement to be effected by Platonic education -- although
what is being moved is not the eye but the soul. I shall turn shortly to the nature
of this movement and how Plato thinks it is best accomplished.
Before turning to the process, however, recall briefly what Plato sees as the
end result of such movement, the epistemic condition of the philosopher-ruler.
Such a person Plato is willing to credit with understanding (epistêmê). Such a
person has a secure grasp of the forms, not just in the abstract but as they
manifest themselves in things around us (402B5-C8, 520C4-5). Such a
person's view of things is synoptic: he "sees things whole" or "has a unified view
of things."[5] It is Plato's bold claim that only when such people are allowed to
rule will a community flourish. The stakes involved are very high, and the value
of any process that can reliably produce such people is obviously very great.
Education as Reorientation
Perhaps the first thing we notice about the prisoners in the cave is that they are
looking in the wrong direction. Their bonds prevent them from turning their
heads away from the rear wall of the cave, and what they need to see is behind
their heads (514B1-2, 515A9-B1). The first step in the journey out of the cave is
to stand up and turn around towards the firelight (periagein, 515C7), and the
first impulse of the freed prisoners upon being made to look towards the firelight
is to turn back towards the familiar shadows (apostrephein, 515E2). This notion
of orientation is central to Plato's idea of education: he later describes real
education as the art of orientation (technê... tês periagogês, 518D3-4) and the
educator's task as that of turning souls around (metastrephein, 518D5).[6]
This is to be contrasted with what Plato presents as a common practice of
educators, who "claim to introduce knowledge into a soul which doesn't have it,
as if they were introducing sight into eyes which are blind" (518B6-C2). Such a
view of education neglects the fact that the power to learn and the organ with
which to do so is present in everyone (518C4-6, 519A3-B6, 527D6-E3,
530B6-C1). Education, Plato remarks,
should be... the art of orientation. Educators should devise the simplest
and most effective methods of turning souls around. It shouldn't be the art
of implanting sight in the organ, but should proceed on the understanding
that the organ already has the capacity, but is improperly aligned and isn't
facing the right way. (518D3-7)
Plato refers to this power to learn as phronêsis or intelligence at 518E2, where
he goes on to say that it is useful and beneficial, or useless and harmful,
depending on its orientation (518E4-519A1). Part of Platonic education, then,
consists in reorienting this neutral capacity of intelligence, directing it away from
one sort of object and towards another.
But this is only part of the story. Plato goes on to remark about the soul of the
bad but clever person that
if this aspect of that kind of person is hammered at from an early age, until
the inevitable consequences of incarnation have been knocked off -- the
leaden weights, so to speak, which are grafted on to it as a result of
eating and similar pleasures and indulgences and which turn the sight of
the soul downwards -- if it sheds these weights and is reoriented towards
the truth, then (and we're talking about the same organ and the same
people) it would see the truth just as clearly as it sees the objects it faces
at the moment. (519A8-B5)
This person's desires, at least as much as his intelligence, account for his
condition. There is an important cognitive dimension to Platonic education, but
there is an equally important affective or desiderative dimension. Consider the
money-lover Plato describes in Book IX:
His reasoning and spirited parts... are made to sit on the ground on either
side of the king's feet [i.e. his appetitive part]. The only calculations and
researches he allows his reasoning part to make are concerned with how
to start with a little money and increase it, the only admiration and respect
he allows his spirited part to feel are for wealth and wealthy people, and
he restricts his ambition to the acquisition of money and to any means
towards that end. (553D1-7)[7]
Analogous claims are made about the honor-loving person (475A9-B2,
549C2-550B7) and the wisdom-loving person or philosopher (581B5-7,
475B8-C8). So the educator must be concerned not only with the reorienting of
intelligence, but with desires as well. The reorientation of desire is
accomplished by proper use of traditional mousikê and gymnastikê, discussed
at length in Books II-III, and it is clearly presupposed by the educational
program outlined in the pages following the cave image. I shall discuss it briefly
before turning to the cognitive dimension in the next section of this essay.
Focusing entirely on reorienting the student's intelligence runs the risk of
ignoring fully two-thirds of the student's soul, since like everyone he is a
compound of three parts.[8] As Plato observes in Book IX,
the correspondence between the three classes into which the community
was divided and the threefold division of everyone's soul provides the
basis for a further argument .... Each of the three mental parts has its own
particular pleasure, so that there are three kinds of pleasure as well. The
same would also go for desires and motivations. (580D2-8)
This claim -- that each part of the soul has its own particular pleasure -- is
essential to understanding the sort of reorientation Plato wants to effect by
means of education. In the Republic, people are sorted into classes (producers,
guardians, rulers) according to which part of their soul motivates or rules them.
The appetitive part is described as money-loving and gain-loving
(philochrêmaton, 580E5; philokerdes, 581C4), and its principal concerns are
the pleasures of food, drink, and sex (439D6-7). The spirited part is
honor-loving (philonikon, 58162, C4) and focuses on the pleasures of
competition, with doing what is noble and avoiding what is base. The reasoning
part is wisdom-loving (philosophon, 581B9, C4) and is "entirely directed at
every moment towards knowing the truth of things" (581B5). Since the goal of
Platonic education is to produce philosophers, we need to know how best to
bring people whose primary desires may be for food or drink, or for good
reputation, to the state where their primary desires are for wisdom and truth.
Central to Plato's conception of desire and its educability is the idea that
anyone whose predilection tends strongly in a single direction has
correspondingly less desire for other things, like a stream whose flow has
been diverted into another channel.... So when a person's desires are
channeled towards learning and so on, that person is concerned with the
pleasure the soul feels of its own accord, and has nothing to do with the
pleasures which reach the soul through the agency of the body.
(485D6-12)
Like a closed hydraulic system, each person has a definite amount of
desiderative energy, and if that energy is expended on one sort of object, it is
not available to expend on another sort of object.[9] Reorienting the soul
involves rechannelling desires, diverting them away from one sort of object and
towards another. How is this done?
The process starts long before the student begins his mathematical studies,
much earlier in the Republic (Books II-III, 374E10-412B1). Plato disparages
this "primary education" at 522A2-B1 -- "there's nothing in it which can lead a
student towards the kind of goal [we're] after at the moment" -- but it is clearly
presupposed by the mathematics-intensive curriculum he goes on to outline. In
part, this is a matter of exercise for the body (gymnastikê) and cultural studies
for the soul (mousikê) (376E3-4), although even gymnastikê is primarily aimed
at the soul (410B5-412A2). It may even be the most important stage in the
educational process:
The most important stage of any enterprise is the beginning, especially
when something young and sensitive is involved.... That's when most of
its formation takes place, and it absorbs every impression anyone wants
to stamp upon it. (377A12-B3)
The stories we tell, the poetry we read, the music and songs we play and sing,
can instill in the young student's soul good rhythm, harmony, grace, a
disciplined and good character, and love of beauty (see 376E9-403C8,
especially 400D1-403C7). Mousikê, cultural education, is important, Plato
maintains, because
rhythm and harmony sink more deeply into the soul than anything else
and affect it more powerfully than anything else and bring grace in their
train. For someone who is given a correct education, their product is
grace; but in the opposite situation it is inelegance. A proper cultural
education would enable a person to be very quick at noticing defects and
flaws in the construction or nature of things.... He'd find offensive the
things he ought to find offensive. Fine things would be appreciated and
enjoyed by him, and he'd accept them into his soul as nourishment and
would therefore become truly good; even when young, however, and still
incapable of rationally understanding why, he would rightly condemn and
loathe contemptible things. And then the rational soul would be greeted
like an old friend when it did arrive, because anyone with this upbringing
would be more closely affiliated with rationality than anyone else.
(401D5-402A4)
Stories and songs affect the student's desires, and do so in ways that do not
rely on reasoning.[10] Music does so especially directly: "rhythm and harmony
sink more deeply into the soul than anything else," and can produce "grace"
(euschêmosunê), which clearly involves harmony among the student's desires
(401D5-6; cf. 410A7-9, 423E4-5, 424E5-425A6).[11] Stories can contribute to
this end as well by providing the student with models to imitate. Plato takes the
power of imitation very seriously:
Any imitative roles [children] do take on must... be appropriate ones.
They should imitate people who are courageous, self-disciplined, just,
and generous and should play only those kinds of parts; but they should
neither do nor be good at imitating anything mean-spirited or otherwise
contemptible, in case the harvest they reap from imitation is reality.... If
repeated imitation continues much past childhood, it becomes habitual
and ingrained and has an effect on a person's body, voice, and soul.
(395C2-D2)[12]
Songs and stories bring about changes in parts of the soul other than the
reasoning part, which is why Plato dismisses them at 522A2-B1 as having
nothing to offer the educational program described in Book VII. But it is clear
that Plato believes that without the order and grace they provide, this program
would have little chance of success.
Another aspect of early upbringing presupposed by the educational program of
Book VII is gymnastikê, physical training (403C9-410B3), proper diet and
regimen and a variety of competitive games.[13] It is clear from 410B5-412A2
that even gymnastikê is primarily aimed at the soul; the educator's aim here is
to work a change analogous to that brought about by mousikê:
The goal he aims for with this physical exercise and effort is the spirited
part of [the student's] nature. This is what he wants to wake up. (410B5-6)
The educator "wakes up" the spirited part of the student's soul (egeirein; the
same verb is used when Jesus tells his disciples to go out and raise the
dead, Matthew 10:8). Plato's other similes for what the educator must do here
include stretching and relaxing strings on a lyre (410D8-E2, 412A4-7), forging
iron (411A9-B2), and feeding and starving (411C4-D5). The goal is to avoid the
excessive docility and softness produced by exclusive attention to mousikê and
the intractable brutishness and hardness produced by exclusive attention
to gymnastikê. The idea is to enable the reasoning and spirited parts to work
together in the management of the appetitive part: together the former can be
"put in charge of" or "guard" or "watch over" the appetitive part (prostatein,
442A5; phulattein, 442B6; têrein, 442A7). Ideally, there should be concord and
attunement among the parts (442C10-11, 589B3-4). The best blend
of mousikê and gymnastikê produces the "harmonious" and "docile and
orderly" temperament called wisdom-loving or philosophical (410E1-3, 411C5;
see also 441E8-442A2).
By describing this temperament as philosophical, Plato is not claiming that such
people have genuine understanding (epistêmê) or that by virtue of their cultural
and physical training they are equipped to grasp the forms. Such training can
produce habits of inner harmony and grace, not understanding, In the terms of
the cave image and the discussion that follows it, mousikê and gymnastikê can
help to free a chained prisoner and turn him around towards the firelight to see
the objects that cast the shadows. But since neither is concerned with the
reasoning part of the soul or with what is intelligible, they cannot help the
prisoner out of the cave. They leave the student at the bottom of the rough
steep slope, still focused on perceptible things. He has not begun the upward
journey out of the cave into daylight which Plato likens to the soul's ascent to
the intelligible realm (517B4-5). So, indispensable as they are, they are only the
beginning of the student's educational journey.
Dialectic: A Curriculum
The next stage of the upward journey, which helps the prisoner up out of the
cave and into the light of day, and which enables him to see real things by the
light of the sun, is a more straightforwardly cognitive process. Plato says a great
deal about the cognitive dimension of education in the pages that follow the
cave image. He outlines a curriculum that progresses through arithmetic, plane
and solid geometry, astronomy, and harmonics (522C6-534D1). These
mathematical studies occupy prospective guardians for ten years, from age
twenty to age thirty (537B8-D2). Although he criticizes the ways these subjects
are commonly taught, Plato insists that properly pursued they can lead the
people who study them "up to the light" (521C2) and contribute to "the
reorientation of a soul from a kind of twilight to true daylight" (521C6-7). It is this
program of study that helps the student out of the cave into the outside world,
and equips him to see and understand the things outside, the heavenly bodies,
even the sun itself.
Why does mathematics play such a large role in Plato's curriculum? Scholars
frequently cite Pythagorean influences, and this is no doubt part of the story.
Aristotle reports that Plato "follows [the Pythagoreans] in many things"
(Metaphysics 1.5, 987a30), and Pythagorean ideas figure largely in several of
Plato's dialogues, including the Republic. But relatively little is known about
early Pythagorean views, and so this is of limited use in understanding the role
of mathematics in Plato's educational program.
The point of the mathematical curriculum is to focus the student's soul on the
intelligible realm, to wean him away from reliance on and preoccupation with
what is perceptible. This is clear from what leads up to the discussion of the
mathematical sciences. The first thing we need in order to jar the student's soul
out of its complacency are experiences that call upon the intellect (porakalein,
523A10), that force the student to think in terms of intelligible forms
(anogkadzein, 524A6, C7). The clearest examples of such thought-provoking
experiences are those involving number (524D7-525A5). For example, in the
perceptible realm one (whole) is also many (parts); to avoid confusion, the
student is forced to distinguish things as they appear to the eyes from things as
they are in themselves. This is beyond the grasp of perception and requires
thought and reasoning. Hence the mathematical sciences are essential to the
reorientation of the student's soul, and this is why number and counting are said
to have a "consummate ability to attract one towards reality" (523A2-3).
This also explains why Plato is unimpressed by the way the mathematical
sciences are commonly studied. Students must be delivered from reliance on
perception and made to employ purely intellectual processes (526B1-3,
537D5-8, 522C6-525B3). Any approach to the mathematical sciences that
doesn't serve this end, Plato summarily rejects (see 526E1-527B11, 527D5-E2,
529A1-C3, 530E5-531C4). But a bit later on, in a somewhat more positive
statement, he qualifies that rejection when he says that
engaging in all the subjects we've been discussing has some relevance
to our purposes, and all that effort isn't wasted, if the work takes one to
the common ground of affinity between the subjects, and enables one to
work out how they are all related to one another; otherwise it's a waste of
time. (531C9-D4)
The mathematical sciences are all propadeutic to a discipline Plato calls
dialectic, and it is this "common ground of affinity between the subjects" that the
dialectician is concerned to work out. He has a synoptic or comprehensive view
of the relationships the mathematical sciences have to each other and to reality
(537C1-2). The task of dialectic is to work out, with regard to all things, what
each of them is in itself, to give an account of each thing (533B1-3, 534B3-4).
Plato is willing to say that someone who has such a synoptic view has
understanding (epistêmê) of things that the rest of us can only grasp by belief or
opinion (see 601E7-602A1, 534B8-C5, 520C1-6, 402B5-C8).
How does dialectic accomplish this task? Unfortunately, Plato never answers
this question directly. When Glaucon asks Socrates to "tell us the ins and outs
of the ability to do dialectic, and how many different types of it there are, and
what methods it employs" (532D8-E1), he is unhelpfully told that neither he nor
Socrates is up to that task. There are some clues, however. The first comes
with Plato's observation that dialectic "uproots" the things it takes for granted
(anairein, 533C8, often translated "do away with" or "destroy"):
dialectic is the only field of inquiry... whose quest for certainty causes it to
uproot the things it takes for granted in the course of its journey, which
takes it towards an actual starting-point. (533C7-D1)
Recall the divided line analogy. There Plato refuses to allow that
mathematicians have understanding (nous); he calls their condition "thinking"
(dianoia), which is "the intermediate state between believing (doxa) and
knowing (nous)" (511D2-5). Why? Because they
take for granted things like numerical oddness and evenness, the
geometrical figures, the three kinds of angle, and any other things of that
sort which are relevant to a given subject. They act as if they know about
these things, treat them as basic, and don't feel any further need to
explain them either to themselves or to anyone else, on the grounds that
there is nothing unclear about them. They make them the starting-points
for their subsequent investigations, which end after a coherent chain of
reasoning at the point they'd set out to reach in their research.
(510C2-D3)[14]
Mathematicians deal with forms, but their investigations start too far in and take
too much for granted. They treat their concepts -- what it is to be a square or
diagonal and so on in themselves (510D7-511A1) -- as basic, and don't bother
to explain them. As a result, Plato says, they
are evidently dreaming about reality. There's no chance of their having a
conscious glimpse of reality as long as they refuse to disturb the things
they take for granted and remain incapable of explaining them. For if your
starting-point is unknown, and your end-point and intermediate stages
are woven together out of unknown material, there may be coherence,
but knowledge is completely out of the question. (533B8-C5)
Dialectic, on the other hand, uproots what it takes for granted in the course of its
journey. It doesn't leave these things "undisturbed" (akinêtos, 533C2), but tries
to explain or give an account of them (533C2-3, 510C6-8). It isn't that the
dialectician takes nothing for granted; it is rather that, unlike the
mathematicians Plato criticizes, he sees that what he takes for granted in the
course of his inquiries itself requires explanation.
This is where the second clue comes in. To explain or give an account of
something, whether a complex psychological state like justice or a simple
object like a wagon or a shuttle or a lump of clay, is to make clear what it is. One
does this by relating it to other things, saying exactly how it is like some things
and unlike others. (Think of the way Plato gives an account of justice or morality
in the Republic.) This very general idea is used consistently throughout Plato's
dialogues, and it is made the centerpiece of discussion in late dialogues such
as the Theaetetus, Sophist, and Statesman. It is not enough to give an account,
however; one must defend it as well:
If someone is incapable of arguing for the separation and distinction of
the form of goodness from everything else, and cannot, so to speak, fight
all the objections one by one and refute them (responding to them
resolutely by referring to the reality of things, rather than to people's
beliefs), and can't see it all through to the end without his position
suffering a fall -- if you find someone to be in this state, you'll deny that he
has knowledge of goodness itself or, in general, of anything good at all.
(534B8-C5)
The point here is perfectly general, and nothing hangs on the choice of
goodness as an example. Platonic dialectic is the distillation of a familiar
process, conversing (dialegesthai), the give and take of question and answer.
Genuine understanding is articulate, or at any rate articulable: Plato is unwilling
to credit anyone with understanding who cannot give and defend an account of
that which he claims to understand.[15]
This concern for account-giving and explaining what one's inquiries take for
granted makes it clear why, despite his sometimes disparaging remarks about
current practice, Plato is clearly impressed by the geometry of his day. Tradition
has it that he placed over the door to the Academy an inscription saying "Let no
one unskilled in geometry enter." What must have impressed Plato about
geometry is the way in which particular truths can be related to others to form a
system. Someone with genuine understanding of geometry -- someone who
has really mastered the material presented in Euclid's Elements, e.g. -- knows
much more than a lot of particular truths. He understands a system. Not only
does he know that certain things are true and how those things depend for their
truth on other things; he sees the ways in which these particular truths fit
together to form a rationally ordered whole. His view of the subject matter is
synoptic. The dialectician-philosopher has a similarly synoptic view, but one
that encompasses not only geometry but all areas of inquiry.
Plato's conception of the position of dialectic vis-à-vis the sciences is similar to
one expressed much more recently by Wilfrid Sellars, who writes that
The aim of philosophy, abstractly formulated, is to understand how things
in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest
possible sense of the term.... What is characteristic of philosophy is not a
 special subject-matter, but the aim of knowing one's way around with
respect to the subject-matters of all the special disciplines.... It is
therefore the "eye on the whole" which distinguishes the philosophical
enterprise.[16]
This ideal, at least as Plato develops it, where this synoptic understanding is
supposed to reside in single individuals, may strike us as naive or unrealistic.
Interestingly, in later dialogues such as the Laws, Plato himself seems much
less confident about the possibility of identifying this sort of comprehensive
understanding and about the advisability of putting people alleged to possess it
in positions of power (see 875C6-D5, 945B3-948B2). But the underlying idea
that genuine understanding involves what Sellers calls the "eye on the whole"
characterizes Plato's latest dialogues as well as
the Republic (see Sophist 252E9-254D5, Statesman 280A8-285C2, Philebus
17C11-19A2, Laws 875B1-D5).
The Liberal Arts
As we have seen, the purpose of Platonic education is to free the soul of the
things that turn its sight downward and to reorient it towards the truth
(519A8-B5). Such education is liberating. It is also liberal -- Plato insists that
studies in the mathematical sciences not be "compulsory" (epanagkês), on the
grounds that "compulsory intellectual work never remains in the soul"
(536D5-E4). Aristotle suggests a similar distinction in Politics VIII between the
"liberal sciences" (eleutheriai epistêmai) and those he calls vulgar (banausos)
(Politics 1337b4-21). The latter are undertaken because they are useful and
necessary; the former contribute to one's happiness by making it possible for
one to do something worthwhile with one's leisure time. It is doubtful whether
Plato's discussion of education in the Republic had any direct influence on
Aristotle's discussion in Politics VIII, but together these views exerted a
profound influence on subsequent thinking about education.
Yet the outlines of Plato's curriculum are certainly not original. The
Pythagorean Archytas of Tarentum, whom Plato befriended on one of his
Italian journeys, says that
[The mathematicians] have given us clear knowledge about the speed of
the stars and their risings and settings, about geometry, arithmetic,
sphaeric [i.e. astronomy], and last and especially music. For these
studies seem to be related. (Fragment 1 in Diels-Kranz)
This fourfold division of mathematics into arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and
music theory is a Pythagorean commonplace. Aristotle says
(Metaphysics 986a15-18) that the Pythagoreans believed that things are made
up of numbers. But if numbers and points and lines are real constituents of the
world, then arithmetic and music (concerned with numbers and their relations)
and geometry and astronomy (concerned with points, lines, and figures and
their relations) are essential for understanding things. Arithmetic provides the
basis for music, geometry for astronomy -- and we have a rationale for a
Pythagorean mathematical "curriculum." Plato adapts this rationale (and the
fourfold division) to suit his own purposes, and in the generations after Plato it
was codified in many Pythagorean and Neoplatonist works. Nicomachus of
Gerasa, a Pythagorean compiler of the second century, distinguishes the same
"four ways" (tessares methodoi) in his Introduction to Arithmetic. Around the
same time the Middle Platonist Theon of Smyrna, in his
handbook Mathematical Knowledge Useful for the Understanding of Plato,
begins by offering the same fourfold division of the mathematical sciences. It is
clear from works of Plutarch, Galen, and others that by this time the fourfold
division of mathematics was hardening into a curriculum.[17]
Later Greek and (especially) Roman authors, in efforts to produce workable
and uniform courses of study for young men, distinguished between
the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, and logic) and the quadrivium (arithmetic,
geometry, astronomy, and music theory). In the hands of Roman authors such
as Varro, Cicero, and Seneca these studies became the artes liberales,
subjects suited for the education of a Roman citizen, studied not for
straightforwardly practical reasons but for the sake of knowledge itself.
Varro's Disciplinae, for example, composed sometime around 40 B.C., is an
influential encyclopedia of the (in this case) nine liberal arts -- grammar,
dialectic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, astrology, music, medicine, and
architecture. Later writers reclassified the last two arts as mechanical or
"servile." Two later works are especially important for their influence on
educational thinking. Martianus Capella's The Marriage of Philology and
Mercury, composed in the first third of the fifth century, is an allegory in which
the seven liberal arts (in the person of seven bridesmaids) give accounts of
themselves to the guests at a heavenly wedding feast. Capella's work was
enormously popular as a school text in the Middle Ages. Another of the most
widely read books in the Middle Ages was Isidore of Seville's Etymologies,
composed around A.D. 630. Book III contained a wealth of information -- much
of it garbled or incomplete -- about the quadrivium. The popularity of Martianus
and Isidore's works as school texts attests to the fact that by the seventh
century A.D. the seven liberal arts had become a standard educational
curriculum. They became the organizing principle even for the education of
monks, as Cassiodorus's Institutiones (ca. 550) makes clear.
Newwww
So, there are people who are passing by the walkway, carrying objects made of stone,
behind a curtain-wall, and they make sounds to go along with the objects. These objects
are projected onto the back wall of the cave for the prisoners to see. The prisoners talk and
discuss these projections and come up with names for them; they are interpreting the view
of the world, as it is intelligible to them. It is almost as though the prisoners are watching a
puppet show for their entire lives. This is what the prisoners think is real because this is all
they have ever experienced; reality for them is an interpretive existence viewing the world
as a type of puppet show on the wall of a cave, created by shadows of objects and figures.
In a way, this is not dissimilar to our understanding of evidence-based practice, we have a
version of truth interpreted through the views of others and we, as clinicians, have to make
sense of it and also interpret it ourselves, for others.

Research evidence is still testimony of evidence in that we must trust the rigor, process and
presentation of it. We may not have completed and interpreted the research ourselves and
therefore careful scrutiny through peer review and individual critical analysis is of utmost
importance. The prisoners also co-construct the world between them, sharing a dialogue
surrounding the images cast in front of them. As physiotherapists, we also share dialogue
surrounding professional practice, or own values and preferences as well as what we think
“works” for patients from many different perspectives. Back to the story:

One of the prisoners has help and breaks free from his chains. Then he is forced to turn
around and look at the fire. The light of the fire hurts his eyes and makes him immediately
want to turn back around and

“retreat to the things which he could see properly, which he would think really clearer than
the things being shown him.”(2)

In other words, the prisoner initially finds the light (representing the truth, an alternative
truth or reality) very challenging to see and so does not want to pursue it. It would be easier
to look away back into the shadows.

However, after his eyes adjust to the firelight, reluctantly and with great difficulty he is
forced to progress out of the cave and into the sunlight, which is a painful process. This
represents a journey of greater understanding and the challenges that come with it. We
have all found the journey of gaining knowledge, interpreting it and applying it a challenge
in one way or another in our personal and professional lives. The story continues:

So the prisoner progressed past the realm of the firelight, and now into the realm of
sunlight. The first thing he would find easiest to look at is the shadows, and then
reflections of men and objects in the water, and then finally the prisoner is able to look at
the sun itself which he realises is the source of the reflections. For me, this represents the
way in which knowledge can be delivered may be best understood within the context of
previous experience including socially acceptable constructs. This allows connections to be
made between our prior views of the world and the formation of new information or
knowledge that we have perceived and interpreted. When these connections relate to prior
experience or conceptualised within familiar paradigms, they become easier to digest,
absorb and interpret successfully. Simply being told new information in an abstract way or
delivered in a style and manner that is out of keeping of social norms may not be a
successful strategy.

Copied from @michael_rowe twitter feed 28th March 2018

Back to the escapee: When the prisoner finally looks at the sun he sees the world and
everything surrounding him and begins to feel sorry for his fellow prisoner’s who are still
stuck in the cave. So, he goes back into the cave and tries to tell his fellow prisoners the
truth outside. But the prisoners think that he is dangerous because the information that he
tells them is so abstract and opposed to what they know. The prisoners choose not to be
free because they are comfortable in their own world of ignorance, and they are hostile to
people who want to give them an alternative view of the world. My interpretation is that
there is a natural tendency to resist certain forms of knowledge, particularly if the subject
area has been around for a while. Ignorance is bliss! The prisoner that escaped from the
cave questioned all his beliefs as he experienced a change in his view of the world rather
than just being told an alternative. Being a passive observer, as the prisoners who wish to
stay in the cave, would generally prefer to keep things as they are. This says something to
me about the experience of knowledge translation; the impact will depend on a number of
variables that effect an individual’s perception.

According to Plato, education is seeing things differently. Therefore, as our conception of

truth changes, so will our engagement with education. He believed that we all have the
capacity to learn but not everyone has the desire to learn; desire and resistance are
important in education because we have to be willing to learn alternative paradigms even
though it may be hard to accept at times. Creating the desire to learn through the style and
manner of motivational interviewing (3) makes even more sense here, particularly with
regards to the ‘righting reflex’. The ‘righting reflex’ is the natural tendency that
well-intended people have to fix what seems wrong or incorrect and to set them on to the
‘proper’ course. This often results in telling people what to do in a very directive manner
that frequently ends up putting people off or stifling change rather than steering people on
an alternative path.

The people who were carrying the objects across the walkway, which projected shadows on
the wall, represent the authority of today. Within the physiotherapy profession, they may be
our union leaders, educators, researchers, course providers, cultural influencers, social
media icons as well as clinical and professional leads; they influence the opinions of people
and help determine the beliefs and attitudes of people within our professional society. The
person who helped the prisoner out of the cave could be seen as a teacher. Socrates
compares his work as a teacher like that of a midwife. A midwife does not give birth for a
person, however a midwife has seen a lot of people give birth and coached a lot of people
through it, similarly, a teacher does not get an education for the student, but can guide
students towards it. Similarly, professional dialogue appears best suited
towards guiding people towards alternative “truths” or perspectives. The style and manner
of its delivery is clearly important and it appears to have the greatest effect if it is
surrounded by within and between each other’s experiences that create connections with
other previous understanding. Using a direct style and manner that is out of keeping with
professional dialogue is unlikely to facilitate learning or behavioural change, in fact, it is
more likely to make people resist it. Much like, if the escaped prisoner returned to the other
prisoners brandishing a torch lit by the flame and put it close to them to see an alternative
perspective. This would likely cause the imprisoned prisoners flinch and close their eyes
from the light, therefore representing stifling learning and behavioural change. An
alternative method would be to introduce the light and demonstrate how it changed the
shape and position of the shadows while talking them through the process allowing the
prisoners to change the perspective through cognitive and perceptive dissonance,
therefore representing a challenge in the experience with brand new alternatives presented.
Then the attention could be drawn to the firelight and then to the outside and show
alternative possibilities.
I hope this blog highlights how we might communicate with each other and helps to reflect
on not only what we say, but perhaps more importantly, how we say it! More specifically,
the experience of knowledge translation can be transformative if the learner has a direct
personal experience. The least effective means of communication of knowledge may be
about giving information in a style and manner that is outside of social norms. This is most
likely to be polarising, rather than inviting people along with you. A level above this might
be information giving that is lacking context or information provided in a style and manner
that is hierarchical or top-down. The greatest impact may be that which directly engages
with its audience in a way that relates to their previous experiences with the learners
making connections themselves during a sense-making process.
Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" in Modern Politics
September 22, 2009 at 5:36 AM

In his classic work "The Republic," Plato uses many

examples to help his readers visualize the concepts he relates. One such example is how
Plato's famous "Allegory of the Cave" relates to Modern Politics.

Basically, the allegory illustrates the most sheltered environment possible, in which a
certain number of captives are restrained against a cave wall since before they can
remember. While their bodies are bound to the side of the cave, images projected off of a
fire dance back and forth on the wall in front of them. To these people, the dancing images
are reality. For example, a shadow of a puppet is a man, a paper triangle is a tree, and the
captive who can most accurately predict what shadows will appear next is the group
scholar. Therefore, their experience in the cave is the only experience they know of life. Of
course, Plato did not come up with this example merely as an entertaining story, as the
allegory of the shows many of Plato's beliefs regarding democracy. Many different
interpretations can be derived from this example, such as different possibilities for
reforming democratic government. Two lessons taught in the allegory of the cave are the
importance of both education and the media in representative forms of government.

First of all, the allegory teaches that an educated population is essential to a successful
democracy. Before the cave dwellers know anything of the outside world, they will remain
convinced that the shadows they see dancing on the wall, and the sound of the men behind
the wall carrying around the puppets, are reality. Anything other than that will remain a fairy
tale for the gullible to fall for. However, once the cave dwellers are brought outside the cave
and educated on the reality known on the surface, then they will become a much more
productive member of society. The same can be said about uneducated members of a
democratic society. For example, people who lack a quality education are very similar to
the people stuck in a cave. While they think that they know the truth, they only know the
images on the wall and the sounds of their captors. Also, the people stuck in the cave can
be compared to the third level in Plato's perfect republic, for they only know their own
appetites. Once they begin their education, in this case breaking free of the bonds and
traveling up the cave to the light, they move up to the next level, the auxiliaries. Of these,
only a select few move completely out to the next level , which is to see the outside world
and comprehend it all. These people are Plato's guardians. When the three classes are all
put together, they make up the three social classes of Plato's ideal city. In addition, the
three distinct phases also represent parts of Plato's perfectly just man. The fact that the
guardians once were completely blind to reality in the cave shows that they possess all
three elements, which ties in with the rest of Plato's philosophy in the work. In conclusion,
education is a vitally important aspect of a democracy as it makes self government itself
possible, as well as making many other aspects of life more enjoyable.

Next, the allegory of the cave has another modern implication: as an example of the
media's effect on the voting population. In the cave example, people strapped to the side of
the cave only saw what the people behind them wanted them to see, and the captives only
heard what the projectors wanted them to hear. Furthermore, in the cave example the
people projecting images for the benefit of the captives first observed these images outside,
then gave their impression of it to the captives. Likewise, the modern media come in
between the source of political news, the law-makers themselves, and the general
population. The only way to avoid relying on the dancing shadows for important political
information is to watch the growing number of unfiltered cable stations that feature
constant live broadcasts of law-makers in action. Of course, virtually no one actually tries to
keep up in that fashion. Therefore, the next best way to obtain information is to read
periodicals such as daily newspapers or magazines, or even read information off of the
internet. Of course, not as many people read consistently anymore, and the internet still is
not the vital information-spreading device many play it up to be. Therefore, the majority of
the population watches television for its news. Of these people who watch television for
news, the vast majority watch low quality news programming more geared to earning
money for the station then delivering news. In fact, most studies show that people who
watch network news as their primary source of information are as well informed as people
who do not actively follow the news at all. So where does that leave the majority of the
voting population of this country? In the cave with the people who have been strapped
there for their entire lives. If the population is not careful about their consumption of the
news, then they can easily be duped into having their opinion controlled by a biased media.
Therefore, a quality free press is essential to a democracy as it will inform the population
about current events well and keep the country running smoothly.

Even today in our modern world, there are still numerous examples of how the allegory of
the cave applies in the world of politics. Two particular examples of how it remains true are
in the realms of education and the media, as well as provide the most effective way to
reform democracy as we know it: by educating the masses about not just politics but all
other areas of knowledge as well. To this day, Plato remains a key figure in the
development of political thought, and the allegory of the cave is just one example of how
his influences remain felt