Allegory Of The Cave In Book VII Of The Republic

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Allegory of The Cave
In Book VII of The Republic, Socrates introduces the comparison between “ the effect of education and [the] lack of it on our nature. Socrates describes the cave as humans living in a dark man made cave with an entrance a long way up that is open to light and is as wide as the cave itself. Prisoners since childhood had been fixed in one position. Bonded by their necks and legs in which they can only see what's in front of them. Therefore have no knowledge of whom they are next to. Puppets are reflected by a fire above and behind the prisoners. The prisoners have no control of what they see and are only released to get food . Since they have no control over what they see they are ignorant to the other ways of learning. The cave is isolated reality where no one could escape, nevertheless one prisoner is set free, and experiences the real world for his or her self. After a while the prisoner comes back with a whole knowledge of the world around him and understands what the cave had done to him and to the his cellmates that are still trapped.
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The former prisoner unbinds their chains and tries to get them to look around. Instead of being grateful and experience something new they started to shout no and asks to be placed back in their bonds which is odd yet normal. The prisoners have become so used to being a dark cave where the images are given to them and they are afraid of all the things they have to learn for themselves. The prisoners are afraid of stepping their comfort zone because they have been isolated for so long they don’t know how to react to something they have never

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