I know, Nick, that that is your point. I think it's and excuse not to do the work. I don't buy this negativity for a second. If you wear dark glasses you are going to see a dark world.

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But there is no negativity. People like me search for higher meaning and purpose. We've lived lives where its absence is obvious. Now I discover that it is this way because man is asleep and we have the potential to awaken to reality and experience meaning and purpose as intended by creation. It begins with the simple suggestion as to how to begin to "know thyself."

It is not a matter of dark glasses or rose colored glasses but to gradually remove the glasses and become free of the reliance on imagination that denies the God/Man connection natural within the scale of "being."

You see this as negative and I see it as meaningfully positive.

Nick,

I think that the two allegories, the Cave and Beast, need to be understood in their larger context. After only a cursory review I’m no source for understanding the context but many philosophers and academics throughout history are. It has been said that all of western philosophy has merely been footnotes on Plato. I see some simple and obvious points and can parrot back some of what I have read:

I don’t believe that Plato was free from political self-interest. He desired to be a lawyer but when Socrates was executed Plato changed course and desired to be a great philosophical teacher as Socrates had been. This can only be seen as an ostensive act of political activism. That Plato was not above the rest of us mere mortals and did indeed have a bias is obvious to me. In the context of The Republic and the Cave allegory specifically he created a need for education, the students of which were not mere pipe smoking coffee shop philosophers but the next Rulers of the Hellenistic World, Philosopher/Kings. And whadaya know? Plato establishes the first university. It begins in a city park the name of which is where we get our word Academy.

Plato adheres to a faith in the “Idea of Good,” a single universal idea that explains all. It is easily understood as being synonymous with God. It is not unlike the modern Physicist search for the single theory to explain everything in the universe, the unified theory. I believe that it is your interpretation that Plato presents this as what one sees when ascending out of the cave. Plato say’s that should anyone leave the cave and grasp this Idea of Good, when they returned they would rightly be able to explain the shadows on the wall a thousand times better than the inhabitants. Also Plato says that this Idea of Good is eternal and inerrant. All of western philosophy has been footnotes on Plato, yet they have been critical footnotes. Beginning with Aristotle each philosopher critiques those who have gone before, disproving him and advancing his own Idea of Good, which is subsequently disproved by the next philosopher. In other words as we sit here in the cave no one has ever come back in with true knowledge of the Sun. The Idea of Good remains elusive.

Additionally The description of the two disorders of sight; the one entering the light and the other entering the dark hint at an interpretation that has mankind existent in both realms. It may be supposed that it is the short sighted interest laden politicians in the dark and the visionary objective philosopher in the light. The two disorders would be the politician turned philosopher blinded by the light and the philosopher turned politician blinded by the dark.

If one continues reading after the Cave allegory Plato explains in detail how one can escape the cave or come to understand the Idea of Good. It will happen through the study of mathematics, plane geometry, solid geometry, dynamic geometry (astronomy) and harmonics. Although in many ways a scientific visionary, Plato hasn’t been validated by the tremendous advances mankind has witnessed in these sciences.


The Beast allegory is rightly perceived by the honest observer as being a universal element, or perhaps better described as affliction, of the Human condition. I personally marvel at the ease with which Plato’s poetically worded description of the Beast is able to transcend 23 centuries to be as true today as it was then. Yet I can’t help but suspect that because of the specific involvement of Sophists in the allegory that it doesn’t contain some element of polemics against his political and philosophical rivals who have in essence made a mockery of philosophy and dialectics. In fact the entire book has a certain flavor of apologetics for philosophy in general and of philosophers as a specific class of men. It may not even be too irreverent to say that it all may be an advertisement for Plato’s Academy.

Z

I'm glad that you've taken to reading Plato with such an open mind and are raising good questions. You are going against the grain now but IMO we need more people willing to go against the grain.

Jacob Needleman in his book "The American Soul" makes this disturbing assertion in the introduction:


The complete lack of this quality of ideas in both public education and the media that should inspire such thought is having a disastrous affect IMO. The artificiality, coldness, and cruelty that sells in the media and what we call "entertainment, is a result of this loss. That is why for the sake of the young and future generations, such ideas as within Plato must be kept alive for them to touch the heart so the attraction to philosophy can be the search for wisdom for them rather than the need to out intellectualize someone that it is now.

Politics has made it so now that it would be impossible for public education to reflect the need contemplation of the higher ideas serves. Even the simple act of allowing kids the opportunity in the morning of a period of silence for personal inner work such as prayer to help them acquire perspective the rest of the day can be put in is denied.

So it is up to private education certain psycho/spiritual paths, and clubs to keep quality ideas alive for the minority still capable of being open to them.


Don't be so sure. Don't forget that Socrates asserts that anyone doing so will be ridiculed in one form or another. Knowledge of the higher has to be presented in certain ways and even in the form of a lie to compensate for this programmed rejection.

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There is someone on my path and I don't mention his name since he is like this so naturally is different to all people. I cannot pull him down to my level but must raise my impartiality so as to be able to begin to experientially understand. It took me a while to see how it must be this way.

Many would be insulted at the "lie of Kama." But as offensive as I felt it years ago, I now accept it as brilliant and necessary.


I remember reading once that true fine art will always be in the present. It cannot be outdated since it is always relevant. Plato is like this. The ideas within his writings as you suggest are as true now as then and the Beast allegory is a perfect example. It is the timeless human condition which can be verified by people with the need and courage to impartially look within.

I won't be around much longer but would just like to say that it has been a pleasure sharing with you and hopefully you will become one of the minority that will be keeping such ideas alive.

Nick,

Z: “In other words as we sit here in the cave no one has ever come back in with true knowledge of the Sun. The Idea of Good remains elusive.”

Nick: “Don't be so sure. Don't forget that Socrates asserts that anyone doing so will be ridiculed in one form or another.”

Plato made clear that the Idea of Good would be perfect, non-contradictory and in harmony with mathematics, geometry and astronomy. It hasn’t happened yet despite the fact that we are now well advanced in those sciences. Plato and other Greek thinkers were the precursor to an explosion of religions all seeking the Idea of Good, or more aptly the Idea of God. It has not been for the finding but for the seeking. The ensuing age has been characterized by seeking a higher truth. Now as you observe we are beginning to seek something more base, that is the new zeitgeist.

BTW predicting rejection and then taking rejection as validation is extremely poor reasoning and the annoyance that you will inevitably generate with such reasoning is not further validation.

BTW#2 try to differentiate between Socrates the real person of which very little is known and the Socrates that Plato appropriated for himself. They really aren’t interchangeable.

Thanks for the dialog, I’ve learned a lot. Good luck in your journey.