Plato’s allegory and philosophical questions

Abstract

The beauty of Plato is in the beauty of his ideas. It is often said that Western philosophy is a little more than a series of commentaries on Plato’s fundamental ideas. His ideas form the framework of politics which he sees and attempts to use as an instrument of social reconstruction and best hope for man. In his paper, we examine one of Plato’s ideas of social reconstruction captured in his Allegory of the cave – an imaginary construct designed to reflect a situation of ignorance in which man is encapsulated in falsehood. It also shows the difficulty in separating the real from the unreal. To the individual, the allegory of the cave has both logical, epistemological, political, moral, ethical, religious, and social implications.