Cody and Plato

Plato talks about people who know nothing other than what is in front of them for their entire lives. These specific people, being stuck immobile in a cave, know only the shadows and dim lights cast from a small fire behind them. To them, existence itself is nothing more than their experience of shadows moving and muffled noises. What else is there if you don’t know of anything? In my opinion, “Allegory of the Cave” speaks about ambition and progressive thinking. By comparison, he uses the story to highlight our own ignorance. The ‘prisoners’ in Plato’s cave do not have a choice to expand into the world, but we let our own fear trap us into our own metaphorical chains.
When Plato describes the hypothetical result of a man emerging from the cave, it represents the human reaction to change. Many of us resist change because it is unknown and unpredictable. In this particular instance, the change is a new insight about the tangible world around us. Plato is expressing his feelings on our intellectual self-induced entrapment through ignorance and resistance to change or to think in a more universal fashion.
The man who leaves the cave is first pained and confused, but later gets accustomed and has a revelation about his entire existence and what he knows to be real. It is not to be said that our comfort with the known is wrong, but it is limiting to the optimal spirituality to be found in one’s life. If we are accepting of our lives as they are we never challenge or question, prohibiting us from personal and philosophical growth. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” was made to prompt us to investigate our own lives so we can cross-examine our self-set limitations on our interpretation of the surrounding world.