Download Allegory of the Cave

Allegory of the Cave
D. Montoya
Vocabulary
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
abash
abate
abject
abyss
acute
In Class Freewrite
• What is wisdom?
Plato
Socrates
Aristotle
Socrates
• Socrates was born in the mid 400's B.C
• Taught philosophy and taught Plato. Before 400 B.C.
• Began questioning Athenian values, laws, customs, and
religion.
• Brought to trial and found guilty of treason to the gods.
He was sentenced to death.
• His teachings were written down by his student, Plato.
• He was the first to make a clear distinction between
the body and soul, placing a higher value on the soul.
Plato
• One of the most famous Greek philosophers, was
born in Athens.
• In 403 B.C., democracy was restored to Athens.
Plato then tried to get involved in politics, but
was repelled again when his friend and teacher
Socrates was sentenced to death in 399 B.C.
• Plato left Athens after Socrates was killed. He
returned in 387 B.C., and founded a school of
philosophy called the Academy.
• It was considered the first university by many
people.
Aristotle
• When he was 18, he attended the Academy, where he was
a student for 20 years.
• Known as "the intelligence of the school" and "reader".
• Alexander the Great studied under Aristotle until his father,
King Philip, was assassinated and he became king of
Macedonia.
• Aristotle returned to Athens in 334 B.C. and founded the
Lyceum, a school of philosophy.
• He and his followers were called "peripatetic", which
means "walking around". Aristotle taught while he was
walking. After Alexander the Great died in 323 B.C.
• Aristotle was charged with impiety, which was a lack of
reverence for the gods, by the Athenian people..
Plato’s Beliefs
• Plato wanted to achieve aretê, or excellence.
He saw two threats within the polis.
• Democracy: Empowered ignorant people
• Sophist’s false teachings- that nothing is permanent,
values are relative, and knowledge is impossible.
In the hands of philosophers
• To change society, ideas should be placed in
the hands of Philosophers.
• The Republic describes Plato’s ideal state (a
small elite should rule, trained in philosophy,
devoting their lives to the citizens’ happiness,
living without property or families.
How can we measure the goodness of
life?
• You must know what good, just, and beautiful
are, before setting out to live a good, just and
beautiful life.
• “Justice,” is a timeless, eternal thing.
• We cannot see the true forms of justice,
goodness, and beauty because they exist in
another invisible realm, but they are more real
than anything in our experience.
Good
Reality is unchanging and knowable only through
the mind.
E.g.: How can we say that a particular bottle of
California chardonnay “is a good wine” and that
Bob Dylan “is a good songwriter,” unless bothwine and songwriting-share an invisible and
eternal quality of goodness?
E.g.: No one ever saw a square root to two, but it
exists and will always exist, independent of the
sensual world.
Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave”
• Plato’s “Allegory of the
Cave” appears in Book
VII of his most famous
and influential
philosophical dialogue,
The Republic.
An Allegory
• An allegorical writing is the type of writing having
two levels of meanings: literary and allegorical
meanings.
• A literary meaning is the content or the subject matter
and allegorical meaning is the symbolic or
metaphorical suggestion.
• In allegorical writing characters, actions and setting
are used as symbols and they should be interpreted to
make the allegorical meaning.
• Make a list of features of the story that are
allegorical.
• Produce a table showing the features and
their meaning.
Discussion Questions
• Would you want to be released from the cave? Why or
why not?
• What is like the cave in our world?
• How is the way you understand the world, your ideas
and beliefs, shaped by the actions of others?
• Who has the power to shape your ideas and beliefs? In
what ways is this good and in what ways is it not so
good?
• Are there things you know to be true? What are they,
and how do you know them?
• What is Plato trying to tell us in the allegory?
HW: Due Monday/Tuesday