Most of us are familiar with the story of Plato's Cave. To summarize, imagine there is a cave deep in the woods. Inside the cave, four prisoners are handcuffed and trapped facing a large blank wall. These individuals have been in this cave since they were born, so they were never aware of what existed in the outside world. They weren't aware there even was an outside world. They cannot look away from the wall, but they can still communicate with each other. High on the wall behind the prisoners is a thin walkway, where people from the nearby market would transport their goods. This was a path used often, with animals and pots crossing at some point throughout entire days. Behind this walkway is a bright light, either a lamp or an opening to allow sun to enter the cave. The light cast shadows from the high walkway down on to the walls that the prisoners are stuck staring towards. Day after day, these prisoners watch as different shapes passed in their field of view, gone as quickly as they were there. Occasionally, sounds and conversations from the walkway above would drift down to the ears of prisoners, but the echoes were muffled and distorted by the time it made it to the ears of the prisoners. The prisoners would watch as these shadows passed by and noises came flooding in. They eventually began assigning names to the shadows based on the two-dimensional shape they saw and the noises they heard. The names weren't similar to the actual terms used by the outside world, but it was all they knew. They spent their years naming these shapes and studying them in their own way. Plato asks what would happen if one of the prisoners managed to escape his bindings. He would exit through the walkway into the bright light of the unfiltered sun, possibly being blinded, but definitely being enlightened. Once he was adjusted, the prisoner would begin exploring the outside world and learning the deeper truths beyond the shadows of the walls. The nicknames him and his peers gave these shadows would become meaningless as he learns that they are entirely different than any of them could have imagined from their chains. Plato continues to question what would happen if the prisoner returned to his peers to tell them about the outside world, and possibly save them from their situation. Would the peers believe him? Or treat him as a fool? "What do you mean? These shadows are the only things that exist. You're telling tall tales." Would they want to leave their bindings? Experience what the escapee had? Or would they continue to write him off?
Plato's Allegory of the Cave is studied by high school and college students across the world, who are expected to analyze it and understand not only how it applied to Plato, but also how it could apply to the world we're living in today. With the basic outlook, just looking to how it applies to Plato, students are expected to understand what position Plato was in when he wrote the piece. Plato was one among the people. He often stuck up for those at the bottom who wished for more from their public and their leaders. Plato was one who felt more enlightened than those around him. This showed in many of his writings. We can assume that he put himself in this position of the enlightened, freed prisoner. He sees himself as escaping a Cave of Ignorance that he believed the common man was stuck in. It's possible based on his assumptions that he too felt as if he was being ignored when he tried to share his enlightenment, many ignoring him, refusing to leave the ignorance he believed they were stuck in. He treats the other prisoners in his story as foolish for willingly accepting their world as they knew it. Is this how Plato viewed those who doubted his teaching? With a more advanced outlook, looking to how this applies to our modern world, students are expected to understand what the allegory could mean for the world that we live in. This train of thought suggests that certain individuals in our society are stuck in a cave, not knowing the truths of the world. Only a certain few are those who truly understand what is happening, and we should trust them if they come to save us.
Personally, my own professor suggested that we, as college students, were all arising from this Cave of Ignorance. It was suggested to us that we were gaining enlightened knowledge that others who didn't walk our path couldn't even begin to understand. He suggested it was our responsibility to guide them and help them, despite the fact they would mock us for trying to tell them the "ultimate truths". This lecture is what drove me to write this piece. This lecture is what drew me to question what I was being told and ask what would happen in my hypothetical "Second Cave".
Imagine an almost exact replication of what occurs in Plato's Cave. Four prisoners. A high walkway above matched with a bright light, filtering shadows of what passes on the wall they are seeing. The difference in this Second Cave, however, is that two of the prisoners are blind and one of them is a mute, speaking only in sign language. The remaining prisoner has no similar ailments, and can easily understand the mute prisoner's signs. For years of their lives, the two prisoners that can see do what they can to communicate to the two blind ones as to what shapes they are seeing along the wall and what they are interpreting them to be. However, even if these prisoners give perfect descriptions of what they can see and what they are thinking, no matter what, these blind prisoners would have a completely different understanding and mental picture of what is going on around them. One day, in this Second Cave, the mute prisoner is able to escape his bindings. Like in Plato's original cave, this prisoner goes out into the world and gains the same enlightenment, understanding so much more than his brethren can imagine. The mute prisoner returns and communicates his findings to the prisoner who can see and understand him. What happens? Regardless, this prisoner will find the stories just as ridiculous. However, the two blind prisoners are completely reliant on him to transmit the information. Would the prisoner try to translate it in words to these other two? If so, would he be fair and translate it perfectly, or would he inject his own personal bias into it in order to disavow the mute prisoners claims even further? Is it possible that this prisoner could even refuse to transmit the information, believing it to be absolutely preposterous? In this situation, he is so convinced that he is living in the world of truth that he would not even give the blind prisoners the option to decide for themselves.
Applying the Second Cave to the real world in my personal view of it, I see the professor that initially began this thought process as the prisoner who was not blind or mute. His students are the blind prisoners. I do not even begin to know who the mute prisoner is. Whoever is enlightened with these truths once taught my own professor, and he put his own spin on what he was told to transmit to the blind prisoners. It's entirely possible that this is not only a three-part system. Whoever taught him could be just as selfish as that fourth prisoner in my story, telling twisted truths to those dependent on him. Regardless of this, whoever began this chain of lies is the most morally reprehensible. He began the lies that potentially generations deeper into the Cave of Ignorance, completely against their will. As the chain continued, the dependent individuals became more and more blind. This is the true impact of bias in education. This is the true danger facing our young, blind students. A danger most of them will never know is there.
-S
Submitted April 24, 2020 at 04:56PM by thewesternfront2017 https://ift.tt/2W24MjM
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