Platos allegory of cave:

The distinction between

appearance and reality

The Story first

STAGE I :
1. A Cave with prisoners chained to their legs and are
sitting facing the caves wall; cannot move and cannot see
outside world; there is faint light passing through a whole
in the walls of cave;
2 Imagine: a puppet player enters the scene and lights fire
behind the prisoners and moves all kinds of goods like
wooden toys of animals or things like that;
3. Their images flash in the wall in front of prisoners.
4. Prisoners imagine that they see live images inside the
cave under the sunlight piercing through the hole.

Mental Game begins:

The Mental Game begins:
Plato suggests that the prisoners would
begin a game of guessing which shadow
would appear next.
If one of the prisoners were to correctly
guess, the others would praise him as clever
and say that he were a master of nature.

Story of Cave: Stage 2

The Escape
One of the prisoners then escapes from their bindings and
leaves the cave.
He is shocked at the world he discovers outside the cave and
does not believe it can be real.
As he becomes used to his new surroundings, he realizes that
his former view of reality was wrong.
He begins to understand his new world, and sees that the Sun
is the source of life and goes on an intellectual journey where
he discovers beauty and meaning.
He sees that his former life, and the guessing game they played
is useless.

 The Return
The prisoner returns to the cave, to inform
the other prisoners of his findings.
They do not believe him and threaten to kill
him if he tries to set them free.

Meanings of the Cave Story

The Cave
In Platos theory, the cave represents people who believe that
knowledge comes from what we see and hear in the world
empirical evidence. The cave shows that believers of empirical
knowledge are trapped in a cave of misunderstanding.
The Shadows
The Shadows represent the perceptions of those who believe
empirical evidence ensures knowledge. If you believe that what you
see should be taken as truth, then you are merely seeing a shadow
of the truth. In Platos opinion you are a pleb if you believe this
(their insult for those who are not Philosophers)!
The Game
The Game represents how people believe that one person can be a
master when they have knowledge of the empirical world. Plato is
demonstrating that this master does not actually know any truth,
and suggesting that it is ridiculous to admire someone like this.

 The Escape
The escaped prisoner represents the Philosopher, who
seeks knowledge outside of the cave and outside of the
senses.
The Sun represents philosophical truth and knowledge
His intellectual journey represents a philosophers journey
when finding truth and wisdom
The Return
The other prisoners reaction to the escapee returning
represents that people are scared of knowing philosophical
truths and do not trust philosophers.

Questions from the Story:

The following questions arise:
Who could be the deceased prisoner?
How many boundary lines in the story?
Why the prisoners wanted to kill the freed prisoners story?
What mistakes they committed by killing his story, if not
the story teller?
How is then knowledge or education earned?
How many levels of distortion may appear in the education
process?

Moral Theory
There could be a difference between surface
meanings and deeper meanings; between
appearance and reality;
What appears to be true may be simply
images, not aspects of the essential reality;
The Idea (the ideal) is about the essential
reality;
How do the Idea is revealed in this story?

The Idea of a Cave

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 1
The famous Leo Strauss in his book City and Man (1957) says
the following tricks inside Plato's cave may be interpreted as
follows:
1. Light inside the dark Cave and Light from outside falling
inside Cave: Both forms of Light serve the puppet players to
manufacture images that deceive prisoners. (Leo Strauss)
AKP: Let us think of cases of how do Brahmins use light from
real life coming from the outside of cave to deceive Dalits
inside their Cave controlled by them?
AKP: Plato uses light outside cave as having power to
unravel truth. Thus, Plato's inconsistency is not noticed by
Strauss: light contributing to darkness vs his theory of sunlight as liberation/freedom. (AKP)

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 2
2. Puppet Player as governing elites, not masters and Prisoners as
governed class, not slaves (Leo Strauss).
Two counter-arguments against Leo Strauss
AKP: I disagree with Strauss that governed class does not include Slaves.
That is how Greeks really forgot to include Slaves in their language of
power. Trying to understand ruling class politics in terms of evident claims
made by them is to fall into the world inside cave's field. Take, for
example, to understand caste as Chaturvarna is to fall prey to
Brahminical/Straussian/ Platonic deception, for we should not be silent on
Panchamas (fifth strata) of Caste Cave, who physically built caste cave.

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 3
AKP: I also disagree with Strauss that governing class is
different from the master class. This is plainly mistaken. The
governing class are 'deputies' chosen by the masters in ancient
times. The same is true for modern times - Locke' time or our
times. The word 'deputies' is not my word. This is Locke for you.
Deputies are supposed to represent civil society in govt.
Who are the deputies of Brahminical class in ancient India? Did
they manage to rule via deputies or directly? How do we
understand modern caste-class system with deputies from
among prisoners of caste cave? Recall Ambedkar's words and
we will find answers to these questions. Time to ponder.
But for the moment, Strauss, the Chicago Professor, goes off
the mark.

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 4
3. Noble Lie/Deception:
The parable of cave shows that Plato remains critical of deception played out
by elites. However, he defends Noble lie to played out by elites over
prisoners; Even though, he advises Philosopher Kings not to lie to each other
and advises lower orders/prisoners not to lie each other.
Following the example of breeding livestock, Plato advocated eugenics for
human beings. In his ideal state the lower orders must be discouraged from
having children by restricting their access to sex. Publicly, these
unfortunates will be told that the right to have intercourse is randomly
assigned by lot. In reality, though, the Guardians control the access by secret
conclave.

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 5
The allegory of metals is nothing less than a
rationale for maintaining a caste system.
Socrates suggests that if the people believed
"this myth . . . [it] would have a good effect,
making them more inclined to care for the state
and one another (415cd).
Thus the Noble Lie is a contrivance for one of
those falsehoods that come into being in case
of need, of which we were just now talking,
some noble one. (414bc).

A Critique of Platos Best

Defence: Part 6
One should distinguish the Noble Lie from Platos
deployment of myth to convey his ideas.His myths - such as
the story of the Cave in the Republic or in his book on the
Symposium, and in his book on the Winged Soul - are fictions
that are meant to make vivid his philosophical points, which
they complement.Such myths are not meant to deceive.
Strauss asks whether it is true that noble lies have no role at
all to play in uniting and guiding the community.Are myths
needed to give people meaning and purpose, ensuring a
stable society? Strauss implicitly endorses.
AKP: Noble lie for order or social change? Force for power or
freedom? I reject Strauss for making Plato as Noble
Philosopher but presents Machiavelli as Evil Philosopher.