The Allegory of the Cave

In “Allegory of the Cave” by Plato, prisoners have been chained since birth within a cave. Their bodies including their heads are immobilized by chains in order for them to have their direction of viewing fixed upon the wall in front of them. The guards of the cave show them puppets of animals and plants on which they cast shadows upon the wall for their viewing. The prisoners learn the sound of animals though the sounds that the guards create. With them being captive there for so long, they do not know that they are prisoners, they do not know how a certain animal feels or sounds like, and all in all they do not know what a flower smells like. With the shadows and sounds of the guards, the prisoners rely on that to be their only reality.
“The Allegory of the Cave” can be related to our society today by the movie The Matrix. In the movie, it takes place in the future year 2199, where the reality that we know is actually seen as the Matrix. The world was created by machines in order to create an illusion for humans in order to use their bodies’ heat and activity as an energy source. Just like “Allegory of the Cave”, the “prisoners” know nothing of what is really out there. All they know is what a higher being wants them to believe in just like the humans in the Matrix.