Literature

Revisiting Plato’s Cave! The Metaphor of Blindness

Initially I was thinking of this as a way for folks to raise their scores on the first Plato essay–but now I think this could be an interesting challenge for anyone, even if you scored well on the first essay. Here’s the task:

Below are two quotations from Book Six of Plato’s Republic, right before Socrates introduces the famous Allegory of the Cave in Book Seven (the part we read). Read both carefully and make sure you have thought through what Socrates is saying. Then, in 200-350 words, answer the following question: Would your answer to the question in the first essay assignment be different in light of either or both of these quotations? You may address one or both of the quotations in your answer.

Because what I’m asking for is a response to the question, “Would your earlier answer be different,” you do not need to state a thesis. You’ll still be making an argument in answering this question ans supplying informed reasons for your answer.

“But then,” said I [Socrates], “do you think it right to speak as having knowledge about things one does not know?”
“By no means,” he [Glaucon] said, “as having knowledge, but one ought to be willing to tell as his opinion what he opines.”
“Nay,” said I, “have you not observed that opinions divorced from knowledge are ugly things? The best of them are blind. Or do you think that those who hold some true opinion without intelligence differ appreciably from blind men who go the right way?”
“They do not differ at all,” he said.

“Is it, then, ugly things that you prefer to contemplate, things blind and crooked, when you might hear from others what is luminous and fair?”

§ 506c-§ 506d

[Socrates speaking:] “Since the philosophers are those who are capable of apprehending that which is eternal and unchanging, while those who are incapable of this but lose themselves and wander amid the multiplicities of multifarious things, are not philosophers, which of the two kinds ought to be the leaders in a state?”
“What, then,” he said, “would be a fair statement of the matter?”
“Whichever,” I said, “appear competent to guard the laws and pursuits of society, these we should establish as guardians.”

“Right” he said.

“Is this, then,” said I, “clear, whether the guardian who is to keep watch over anything ought to be blind or keen of sight?”
“Of course it is clear,” he said.

“Do you think, then, that there is any appreciable difference between the blind and those who are veritably deprived of the knowledge of the veritable being of things, those who have no vivid pattern in their souls and so cannot, as painters look to their models, fix their eyes on the absolute truth, and always with reference to that ideal and in the exactest possible contemplation of it establish in this world also the laws of the beautiful, the just and the good, when that is needful, or guard and preserve those that are established?”
“No, by heaven,” he said, “there is not much difference.”
“Shall we, then, appoint these blind souls as our guardians, rather than those who have learned to know the ideal reality of things…?”

§ 484b –§ 484d

(Book 6)

Plato, the Republic translated by Paul Shorey (1857–1934)

https://topostext.org/work/768

Next

Find a text FROM BEFORE 1650 that is interesting TO YOU, in any language, and give it (or an excerpt of it if it’s long) a thorough, attentive, and critical reading (i.e., what we’ve been practicing together all semester). Then, in 200-300 words, tell me something you find interesting about the text. BE SPECIFIC! “The text uses imagery” is not specific enough to be interesting; generalities or summaries with no reference to the text usually aren’t.

Short texts are fine–these often make for excellent practice in sustained critical interpretation, and often have their own charm of brevity.

If you choose a text that’s not in either English, Spanish, German, Latin, or Ancient Greek (i.e., the languages I can currently read), please provide a translation so I’ll be able to understand what you’re interpretating.

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