In The Republic, Plato uses the analogy of the cave to help the reader understand his theories of the Forms and the Divided Line. There are four basic areas of Plato’s cave, each representing a different segment of the divided line, which in turn represent a different kind of knowledge and understanding. The journey out of the cave also helps to aide in Plato’s outline for an educational system. A system who’s output is a person with the highest level of knowledge, the philosopher. It is the philosopher who Plato believes to be the ideal ruler for the just republic. However, in order to understand why Plato’s educational system is successful and why the philosopher is the best leader, one has to start in darkness, deep in Plato’s grotto.
Each location in the cave represents a different part of Plato’s Divided Line and understanding of the Forms. The first parts Plato describes are: a wall of shadows with prisoners chained in such a way they can only see the shadows and a causeway of puppets. Each site represents the lower half of the Divided Line that Plato calls doxa, which means opinion. doxa is based on a person’s sense perception and lacks reason. The wall with shadows on it corresponds to lowest form of doxa which is eicasia. Eicasia is hard to translate into English, but it can be translated to mean illusion or imagining. The shackled prisoners have only their sense of vision to rely on; therefore they accept the shadows on the wall.
This is similar to a person who just accepts the political views of his or her parents because that is what his or her parents have told him or her to be true. There is no reasoning on this person’s part, they just accept what they have been told as being true, and that is their reality. To the prisoners, the shadows are their reality. There is no real differentiation between the images, the prisoners see them as one collective reality. Plato believes that this is as far as the majority of people’s knowledge advances.
If a prisoner escapes from the shackles and turns around, the prisoner will then see the causeway with the puppets and the fire. This part of the cave represents the next level of doxa, which is pistiV, or belief. PistiV is different from eicasia because the reality of the prisoner is now broken down into objects. The prisoner is now aware of different objects, like the puppets, and does not just see the images on the wall. Though the prisoner can realize there are objects, he still has no reason for why they exist. The prisoner just believes they exist. This would be similar to someone saying, “just because,” as the answer in an argument. In other words, if a person at this state of thinking was to see a car, they would see just the car and believe it to be an object, but would not realize that it is an imperfect copy of the Form of Car.
After passing the puppets in front of the fire, the entrance to the cave begins to appear on the prisoner’s horizon. Having lived his entire life in the darkness of the cave, the prisoner’s eyes have to adjust to light and he is only able to see shadows and reflections of the objects outside the cave. The light shinning on the objects will now be able to aide the prisoner in making sense of the world outside the cave. In order to make sense of this world, the prisoner begins to reason.
What Plato means by reasoning is applying mathematics to the objects of the world. Mathematical reasoning is dianoia, and achieving this level of thought marks the transition to the upper half of the divided line called episthmh, which means knowledge. The importance of transitioning from pistiV to dianoia, is that dianoia exists in the mind and is intangible. Though this aptitude now exists in the mind, the concepts that make up dianoia are based on observations of the senses and hypotheses that are not known to be true. For example, a mathematician may see a triangle through his sense of vision and then be able to reason about the mathematical properties of the triangle. The mathematician would still not know the Form of the Triangle though, because to know the Form of the Triangle he would not rely on the sense of vision to perceive the shape, he would instead rely on his knowledge of the Form to perceive the Triangle. In dianoia, the mind begins to free itself from relying on sense perception. This lays the foundation for understanding of the Forms.
Once the prisoner’s eyes have adjusted to the light, it is possible for him to look directly at the objects outside. Being able to look directly at the objects and know what they are is nohsiV, which is intelligence. NohsiV is knowledge without sense perception, and without reliance on the hypotheses and assumptions of dianoia. This level of understanding is possible because of the Forms. When the prisoner looks at an object in the sunlight, in the intangible world of his mind he thinks of the Form for that object and does not need “to explain the nature of Forms through images of them.” No longer does the prisoner at this stage of knowledge look at a tree and see the sensible image of the tree, instead the prisoner sees the tree in context of the Form of the tree. This is how dianoia is different from nohsiV because looking at the tree in a state of dianoia is not concrete knowledge because the definition, the Form, is unknown.
The final evolution of the prisoner would be the ability for him to look at the source of light, the sun. The sun represents the Form of the Good, which to Plato is the most valuable Form. Without the light of the sun, seeing would be impossible, and therefore knowledge would be limited to what is attainable in the darkness of the cave. With light from the sun, it is possible to see the existence of sensible objects and, with the truth that comes from the Form of the Good, to see the Forms as they manifest themselves in the world. By achieving nohsiV and then seeing the sun, one is able to use the truth and reason that comes from the Form of the Good to turn the sensible properties of an object into intelligible Forms making no part of it unintelligible. The world is therefore made up entirely of Forms made possible by the Form of the Good.
Having achieved the highest level of knowledge the prisoner is now a philosopher, and Plato believes that it is the duty of the philosopher to return to the cave in order to rule the unenlightened masses. The philosopher will be reluctant to return, which is a good quality in Plato’s eyes because it means the philosopher does not want to rule for power and personal gain. To persuade the philosophers, Plato gives two reasons for why the return to the cave is necessary. The first reason is that the masses of people are not capable of ruling themselves because they have no direction in life. The second reason Plato gives is that a philosopher, who stayed in the world of sunlight, becomes unworldly because all of his time is spent on intellectual matters.
The journey back down the cave is not easy one though, initially adapting to the darkness is difficult. Once in the presence of the prisoners, it is even more challenging to be in the cave because the prisoners will not believe there is a world with sunlight. Furthermore, attempts to release the prisoners from their chains will result in the killing of the philosopher by the shackled prisoners. Still, it is a philosopher’s duty to rule because Plato believes that only a philosopher can make society function properly. It is also the culmination of the philosopher’s education because his intelligence cannot be fully realized until it is put into practice.
The entire process of climbing out of the cave and returning to it is also similar to Plato’s beliefs about education. After giving the analogy of the cave, Plato outlines his plan for an educational system. The system will start in childhood and not end until a person is in his or her fifties. Plato also believes women should be included in the system. Overall, the entire system outlined by Plato has many similarities to modern society, and it has much to do with its current prosperity.
Plato’s educational system starts out by observing children playing games. Plato starts out the system this way because he believes learning cannot be compulsory. Children will want to play the games and by observing them, it will be easy to see who is smart and creative. This concept has carried through to modern times, as most of today’s early childhood education is games and story telling. Through middle school there is some sort of recess or time for games. There is also little official separation within an elementary or middle school for those who are gifted and those are not, but the distinction is clear with observation as Plato wrote thousands of years ago. Since the children are merely playing games or listening to stories, they are in a state of eicasia. They simply take what their teachers and parents put forth to them as reality.
After watching the children play games for a number of years, Plato says that the best shall be put in a separate class. This is similar to the European model for high schools. At the end of middle school in Europe, students take tests to determine what high school they qualify for. Those who desire to continue learning will surely get into the best schools. Plato says that this separate class will be tested rigorously to determine who will advance to the next stage. At this point the students have pistiV, as they begin to see different objects in the world. These teenagers begin to see what they think is the real world. They see the different objects such as politics, relationships, and music.
What’s missing from students’ knowledge at this point is a lack of any unifying themes in their life or any independent reasoning. Plato’s system next takes the best twenty-year-olds and places them in a different school. Here they “gather together into one connected view all the studies which they followed without order in the education in childhood, to disclose the relationship of the studies to one another and to the real being.” This is similar to modern-day universities. A bachelor’s degree is a unification of your knowledge under a common theme. This class of students also has transitioned to dianoia by analyzing their studies and beginning to reason about the objects in the world around them.
The next milestone in Plato’s system comes at the age of thirty. Students will now be tested to see if they posses a dialectic skill that Plato believes is the highest form of knowledge, nohsiV. In doing this they “shake off sight and other senses.” The dialectic skill is the way in which Plato teaches and he believes it has great power. If the power is misused, the student will become disillusioned and become trapped in the world of the sunlight where he is useless.
After taking five years to master the dialectic skill, it is time for the student to teach. This is the same as returning to the prisoners in the cave. Plato says this must be done for fifteen years. During this time, the student is serving the people while gaining a political respect and developing leadership skills in preparation for the final stage of Plato’s education system. This final stage occurs when student turns fifty. Now he is ready to rule over society, and at last he completes his education. His knowledge is at its height as he applies his elevated understanding of the world to serve the best interests of society.
Plato’s educational system is more or less a description of what exists today. The latter three stages are hard to define because of the many paths of adulthood. Today’s society tends to believe that the brightest and most creative people are in charge. Looking at the composition of the government, generally the representatives are some of the best-educated and most experienced people in the country. This seems to correlate strongly to Plato’s notion of a dedication to learning in order to achieve the highest level of knowledge, followed by years of applying the education as a leader in the real world.
Plato’s theory that learning cannot be compulsory also holds true, as we do not make every one go to college or even finish high school if they want. The only reason there is an age requirement for someone to drop out of school is to protect them from a premature decision and to make sure they can function in society. Society couldn’t exist if people couldn’t read, write, and speak to each other.
Plato’s constant emphasis on only taking the best from each age classification supports his belief that education is cannot be compulsory. At face value, Plato’s initial introduction of his educational system can seem harsh with the emphasis on separating the best from the rest. In reality, it’s just an observation of what happens in life. It would impossible to force everyone to be the best. Today, those who wish to further their learning will try hard in high school, college, and even graduate school in order to advance their education. In effect, students are not being cut from the team, or prevented from going to the next level, they just don’t want to because they don’t want to learn anymore. That is why it is impossible to unshackle a prisoner from the cave as a philosopher. If the prisoner wants to learn, he must drag himself up to the light and search for knowledge on his own.
Plato’s educational system consisting of decades of learning, teaching, and leading seems to have had a great influence on modern society. The acceptance of Plato’s educational system provides a great way to train leaders who will be able to keep society in line. Ruling philosophers have two key properties: they’ve reached the pinnacle of knowledge, and they are modest in their ambitions. These ruling philosophers will do the best job possible because they will make the best decisions for the republic, and then they will leave power once they have served their time. Modern society is able to flourish because of these ruling philosophers that are produced by an acceptance of Plato’s educational system.
Using the Divided Line and the Cave, Plato is able to explain his Theory of the Forms and the educational system he envisions for society. Through a long, self-motivated process, a person is able to bring themselves from the depths of darkness in the cave, to the world of light and freedom through knowledge. This long journey can be facilitated by an educational system. Introduced by Plato and accepted by modern society, this system spans almost an entire lifetime and challenges the student to motivate himself in order to gain more knowledge. If successful in achieving the highest form of knowledge, it is the duty of the philosopher to assist others in gaining knowledge, and to lastly rule over the republic.
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