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Plato's Cave

Republic, Book VII · ~380 BCE · a parable about perception
"The prisoners would laugh at him and say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes. It would be better not even to think of ascending."

— Plato
this allegory is at the heart of Plato's metaphysics — the world of sensory appearances is a flickering shadow of the real.
relevance today · social media, information bubbles, AI-generated images, belief without inquiry. the cave is older than its image.