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Analysis Of Socrates 'Image Of The Cave'

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Toward or Away From the Light
Socrates, within his Image of the Cave, calls the attention of the readers toward the education of the populous within society. He describes the struggle of men learning truth as: “And, if he compelled him to look at the light itself, would his eyes hurt and would he flee, turning away to those things that he is able to make out and hold them to be really clearer than what is being shown” (515e). In this image, men are not able to handle the light of the truth, so they run to what they believe they know. Why do men run away from the light? If men want to learn the truth of things, they should run toward the new ideas not being afraid of them. Men refuse to see the light of truth, because they do not comprehend anything of it.
Many times within the image of the cave, the men are shown to get accustomed to something, and then to run …show more content…

Men running away from new truth is directly related to how they learn through life. It is more comfortable to believe that everything is known, rather than understanding that there is more to the truth than what is being shown directly to the men. Men naturally are comfortable in knowing everything, and when something challenges that view, they get scared and retreat back into their supposed true opinions. One could argue that men are fully willing to learn new truths, but as men will always be comfortable knowing things, they will be uncomfortable with the unknown. When learning new truths, man might now always go to the extreme of running away from the truth, but there will be some sort of contrast between the newly shown truth, and their old way of thinking. Being led into the unknown is not comfortable, and unknown opinions are scary when they so drastically oppose what has been taught to a society itself. Man is uncomfortable with the unknown, so they run away from new truths, to things that they have already fully

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