Philosophy
21/01/2015
Ignorance Is Bliss
Plato’s The Allegory Of The Cave suggests to us that life is similar to being chained within a cave, knowing only darkness and shadow, and only as we pursue higher intellectual thought are we freed from these bonds and able to wander out of the cave to view things as they truly are. At first glance, it is suggested: just as a man coming out of a lifetime of darkness in to one of light would be momentarily pained, bewildered, and in disbelief; so too is the case of a man coming out of a primitive acceptance of the world into higher planes of thought and understanding. For example when a child is young and he (or she) is ‘within the shadows’ about the nature of Christmas. He (or she) believes that Christmas is a day when a jolly fat man travels the globe distributing gifts to all the boys and girls. As the child grows older he (or she) comes to realize that Santa Claus is nothing more than myth and folklore. When the child finds out he (or she) has been fooled for all these years and one of the child’s favourite people is actually not even alive, he (or she) is bound to be distraught. After some time in mourning however, the true nature of Christmas (family, sharing, caring et cetera) will be impressed upon the youngling and over time it is this function (of Christmas) which will come to hold the truest merit in the child’s mind. Does this mean that once a child discovers that Santa Claus is not real that the child has escaped the allegorical cave and is now subject to solely pure knowledge? Of course not. For there is always some other thing which humans do not know or understand and in every instance of discovery is unveiled a dozen more instances of questioning. It is as if one is within the belly of a vast cave infrastructure and with each new discovery one climbs into other parts of the cave system which are progressively brighter as one goes along, yet nowhere is there an opening which grants access to the surface. Escape from the cave is not only impossible, yet also absolutely incomprehensible. It is only happiness which prevents us from going insane trying to get out.
“Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants” (Epictetus 1). Epictetus is not talking about monetary wealth, he speaks of intrinsic wealth; happiness in other words. Happiness seems to be a sort of internal force which prevents one from looking too much into things. Happiness is often invoked by the setting of goals and subsequent achieving of them. For example one might set a goal to become a student of Philosophy before one turns thirty years old. If at twenty-three years of age one is accepted to college and begins to take Philosophy classes, then all the criteria for the goal has been met and one thus experiences happiness. While experiencing happiness one is not terribly compelled to seek happiness, for it is already with them. As time goes by the happiness requisitioned from achieving a goal will begin to fade and one must set and achieve another goal to refurbish the happiness. The process of happiness acquisition operates parallel to one’s journey through the allegorical cave system: one desires to escape the cave and one finds a way out into another room. Although the brightness of the new room is often debilitating at first, it ultimately gives way to happiness and one is content to remain in the new room for a time. After some time however, seeking new pleasures, one inevitably wanders further along into an even brighter room and though it is, again, shocking to behold, it ultimately gives way to happiness. What it is that I am suggesting is that happiness is in fact not an end, yet is simply a force to obscure our comprehension of there being no end. This is perfectly logical considering the processes I have just put before thee: we set goals and achieve them to attain happiness, only for the happiness to give way to a further desire. So if one were to achieve the ultimate happiness (stepping completely out of the cave into broad daylight), when that gave way to a further desire what then? Try to comprehend exiting the outside; to be outside and need to go out- it is unfathomable, the mind cannot grasp the concept and so it does not allow one to put oneself in such situations. Therefore every question we answer our mind asks us a dozen more. Each time we walk from one dark cave to another not so dark cave: a dozen cave mouths appear for us to walk down next, growing exponentially each time.
It is not possible to leave this cave we find ourselves in. We may venture all around and go in any room of the cave we so desire, but we may not leave; there is no way to leave even if we tried. Regardless of the allure we have to achieve that goal (of stepping completely outside), the mind cannot imagine such a place (as is demonstrated by the previously mentioned thought experiment) and the mind cannot create what it cannot imagine. Therefore no such place exists, the cave is all there is and all there ever will be.
Works Cited
Plato. “The Allegory Of The Cave.” Pojman, Louis P. et al. Philosophy: The Quest For Truth. 9th Ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 18-21. Print.
“Epictetus.” BrainyQuote.com. Xplore Inc, 2015. 21 January 2015. <http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/e/epictetus384225.html>
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