Allegory of the cave

April 1,2024

last update: 2024-11-19

material

Usually reading translated text is a little confusing, because I feel like I’m hearing the translator’s voice instead of the author’s voice, or in this case Plato. And this gets doubly confusion when the author is from 429 B.C.E.

Still, I found the allegory itself very intriguing.

Being acutely aware of ones own environment, and then being transported into a totally new environment leads you into a sort of shell shock.

I’ve been through this paradigm changing events a couple of times in my very short life. But, there’s a nuance to it that is not fully captured in Plato’s conversation though. Going from the cave to the sun is a lot more painful than, from the sun to the cave. In some way the cave always feels more comfortable because it’s known, and (to stretch the metaphor to its limits) calm.

People who have always been in the sun would never be able to realize or empathize with the pain tolerance and mental gymnastics it takes to understand the “new world”. And, irrespective where you get in the sun world, the cave life is always a part of you. It never leaves and constantly reminds you of what once was.

But then, what to do when you explore and understand the “true world”? I guess the natural answer is to go looking for a world higher than the one you come from. Is that all life is then? jumping from one cave to another hoping to understand the world and deny everything that was, as a hallucination and misunderstanding?