Would Aristotle leave Plato’s cave allegory?
This is a thought experiment, backed with quotes from the Republic and Nicomachean Ethics. It is fun to see if Plato’s description of a philosopher matches his student’s character. Plato’s cave allegory has been subject to many modern pieces like Matrix, Truman Show, Pan’s Labyrinth, Interstellar and had significant impact on our classics such as Heidegger. But, it is a delight to come up with answers to Ancient puzzles.
The Ancient Greece did not have our concepts of freedom, or having control over our own destiny. We wanted Neo to be free though reality is uglier, Truman to leave the movie set and every one of the characters to be in charge of their life. Here, the philosopher leaves the cave in the allegory and discovers “reality” that is beautiful.
What would happen if that philosopher were to be Plato’s student Aristotle who is one of the greatest philosophers and scientists, and we should probably thank him for today’s logic, metaphysics, mathematics, physics, biology, botany, ethics, politics, agriculture, medicine, dance and theatre. What would be the motivation of this important figure, for leaving or not leaving the cave?
What is the Cave Allegory?
We see the cave theory in the 7th book of the Republic where Socrates asks Glaucon to imagine a group of prisoners who were born into those chains, and they are unable to move due to the chains. All they can see is the wall of the cave. Behind them, some men show images and make sounds to the wall, and the prisoners see a puppet show, thinking that what they see in real life and reality is shadows of some objects (Plato Republic. 514 a-515 a).
“They are in it from childhood with their legs and necks in bonds so that they are fixed, seeing only in front of them, unable because of the bond to turn their heads all the way around. Their light is from a fire burning far above and behind them. Between the fire and the prisoners there is a road above, along which see a wall, built like the partitions puppet-handlers set in front of the human beings and over which they show the puppets (Plato Republic, 514 b).”
However, somehow, a prisoner manages to escape from the chains and looks at the fire, which is a recognition of how ignorant we are, according to Plato. And that prisoner’s enlightenment begins as a first stage. Though it hurts his eyes, and he wants to go to the reality that was familiar to him, his eyes begin to adjust, and he continues this process of exploration by leaving the cave. There, he sees the sun, and it is painful at first, but he is now able to conceive the knowledge of the sun which is the reflection of everything in the world, he can grasp the world of ideas, and it is the truth about everything. He then goes back to the cave to enlighten others; though other people seem comfortable in their ignorance (Plato Republic, 515 d).
Meaning of the Cave Allegory
The world is looking terrible; Plato saw this world as a dark cave, but there is the sun that gives everything light in reality. Humans perceive the physical, materialist world as an imitation of reality, but there is the overarching truth that we can find if we can break free of the chains and leave the cave, follow the sun, which is a painful and long struggle, and the person with the ability should educate himself with philosophy and rationality and many other aspects of life to turning around to what is beautiful, just, true, good and reach them at the end of this process.
The world we live in is the darkness of the cave of misunderstandings, and we fail to know the truth by empirical evidence, but we believe that we know. However, what we know are only the shadows.
Would Aristo Leave Plato’s Cave?
The School of Athens, Raffaello Sanzio
Plato, pointing upwards to state that there are these problematic situations in the “empirical reality” of Aristotle. Thus, he is inclined to say that the world we see is a dark cave, and the truth is outside, in the world of ideas. Aristotle’s attitude towards life is treating it as an empirical study, warning Plato to say on the ground say that he should look around, where we live is not darkness or a cave.
“Human beings living in an underground cave, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the cave; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads (Plato Republic, 514 b).”
i. Aristotle in the Cave, 1st scenerio
In a hypothetical scenario, the prisoner philosopher who manages to escape and discovers the world can easily be Aristotle. In the metaphorical cave, Aristotle would examine the chains, the shadows, and everything he could see from birth until the time he is freed by a force. For him, the only reality would not be thoughts, feelings or shadows, but it would be the experience. Because of the doctrine of the mean, he would try to do what suits that situation, and that would be to live the empirical reality of the cave and watch the shadows with others since that is the thing the philosopher has practiced until then. He would not attempt to break-free, or turn his head around even, because the mean is following the life that he had practiced, and he would do the right thing by analyzing the shadows and putting all into a rationale.
“What is to prevent us, then, from concluding that the happy person is the one who, adequately furnished with external goods, engages in activities in accordance with complete virtue, not for just any period of time but over a complete life? Or should we add that he will live like this in the future and I accordingly? The future is obscured to us, and we say that happiness is an end and altogether quite complete. This being so, we shall call blessed those of the living who have and will continue to have the things mentioned, but blessed only in human term. Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1101a).”
In the passage above, he blends the individual self-realization task of people with our own disposition and talent. We should have all the virtues at the right amount and escaping from chains or someone without knowing why you are held, or the alternatives, would not be a virtue.
So, he should be freed by someone, or the chains should break. Otherwise, it would be immoral of him to do that by himself. Assuming that he is somehow freed from the chains, he would look around and examine his surroundings. In a process hypothesis and experiments, he would understand the cave fully through his rationality.
There is a possibility that he would think that there should be more and shape a world of soil, caves, humans, shadows while still in the cave by his rationale since we have mentioned that logic is the policy that derives him. He can figure out how “shadows” and “light” work simply without leaving the cave. Because he is curious in the right amount, he would eventually go out while continuing to analyze. When he comes to the entrance of the cave, he walks out to experience the source of light and shadows directly. He would not rely on the internal, the overarching wisdom, or indirect experiences, but he would experiment the whole as a process.
“Some think that happiness is virtue, some practical wisdom, others a kind of wisdom; while others think it is a combination of these or one of these along with more or less pleasure… It is not likely that either group is utterly mistaken, but rather that at least one component of their view is on the right track, perhaps even most of them. Our account of happiness is in harmony with those who say that happiness is virtue or some particular virtue, since activity in accordance with virtue is characteristic of virtue… so in life it is those who act rightly who will attain what is noble and good (Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1099 a).”
What this passage tells us is that he would not follow the suffering and the pain of the light directly and blindly because it is extreme. And he would not immediately leave the cave because it might be stupid, in the sense that he would have too much courage. But he can’t stay forever either since he has courage just in the right amount for this specific event. We can be sure of one thing, he would certainly try to find an explanation for all the situations that philosopher feels, sees, faces, and experiences, first inside the cave, and outside, after a while of in-cave analysis.
ii. Aristotle in the cave, 2nd scenario
It is intriguing to read Plato and Aristo’s writing, considering the little information that they had in ancient times, they were certainly ground-breaking that influenced so many people. Because of this reason, we tend to be biased. Even more than that, these biases can turn to an apotheosis. Deification or apotheosis is common for famous, successful, ground-breaking people that we are fond of. An example of this can be finding ourselves trying to protect a celebrity that we admire, and we see Plato, Aristotle as celebrities of Ancient Greece. Therefore, there might be an alternative response to “Would Aristo Leave the Cave”. In the first scenario that is above, Aristotle leaves the cave eventually. However, there is a possibility that he might never leave the cave and that is worth mentioning. It seems like leaving and seeing the “good” that Plato set seems like the right thing to do, so we want our wise idol to eventually leave the cave and be worthy of a certain capability.
The good for Aristotle is each sphere of life having its distinctive good, and this sphere could easily be cave politics, or cave rationality since they were born to this and this is the world the prisoners know. Being successful in the cave, being there for others when shadows get scary, the food gets less or for any other problem that could occur in that sphere of life can be solved by the virtuous & wise philosopher, simply by rationality. He can simply join the political life within the cave, and the practice would make a regime in the best interest of the people.
The only motivation for Aristotle to leave the cave can be curiosity, which is simply the case in the previous scenario.
iii. “Would He Return to the Cave?”
Assuming that his curiosity took him out of the cave, there are two possibilities again.
a. The philosopher would then return to the cave because it is the right thing to do, just like in the allegory, and chose a person to explain the world. He would be faithful to his friends and he would know to do the right thing at heart. There would not be a philosopher-king but there would be a ruler or rulers, following the 6 types of regimes, that gets the recommendations on how to rule from the philosopher.
b. The apotheosis may push us to think that he would return since it is the right thing to do since Plato argued that way, and the world we live in promotes heroic acts, but he may not return since it won’t be very logical to do so. The cave was the dark place that Plato stated, and it hid the reality, made the world seem like a hideous place. His curiosity and rationality can derive him to question and discover more and analyze more. There is the sky, it is a cliché, but it is true that the sky has no limits. He has so much more to discover and if he is derived from rationale, curiosity while leaving the cave, curiosity would not make him return to the cave, and the belief that “returning to save others and freeing them, showing them the truth in a Matrix-like-manner” might simply be our perception of the right thing to do. But logic is the most important, and that can only be perfected by discoveries.
Both Plato and Aristo agree that philosophical life is the highest life, and philosophy is for the higher beings. Plato’s philosopher would leave the cave in search of the good, as he is a higher being. Aristotle would have a dilemma; he would not break free since it would be immoral to do so. Considering somehow the chains broke, there would be two possibilities. The curiosity could make him leave the cave eventually, after a period of analysis within his sphere. On the other hand, we might tend to think that it is the right thing to do, and romanticize Aristotle doing so. But why would Aristotle be back in the cave since curiosity and rationality is the thing that makes him go out, and not political motives or heroic acts? He could think that it is simply the right thing to do, but if we imagine an Aristotle who had no idea of Plato’s “good” and the heroic world that is presented to us, would he really think that is the right thing to do?
Plato’s way is full of suffering and not clear. If Aristotle would do this journey and leave the cave, he would do it for the journey itself, based on the prescriptions of Eudaimonia, since he believes that every virtuous act should be done for its own sake.
