Chapter 94 out of the cave of terror

But it is said that after Plato learned a great deal, he was ambitious to rule the people with wisdom, but unfortunately he was sold as a slave by the ruler.Fortunately, his friend paid a high price and bought him back from the slave market. After that, he devoted himself to research and finally proposed the most famous cave theory in the history of world philosophy: Let me make an analogy now.The whole human race is like this group of people: with shackles on their bodies, hiding in dark caves, with their backs to the light.There was a railing behind us, and a fire was burning outside the railing.We see only people walking along the railing behind us, shadows on the wall in front of us, and hear only their echoes.

If some of us turn around, face the light, and look at these people head-on, their first feeling is that their eyes will be dazzled. If they can see these people clearly, they can still feel the joy of watching.If they tell others what they saw outside, others will definitely say they are talking nonsense.Therefore, those who have seen the light do not want to go back to the ordinary world, that is, the dark cave. However, we need to know that people in the cave can see things, all they have to do is turn their bodies to the light.If the shackles of carnal desires that force them to turn their backs on the light are removed, everyone will be transformed and begin to live a real life.Therefore, we need to find out the people who can face the light the most, let them go back to the cave, and tell the people in the cave the advantages of knowledge.If they think it will be hard work, let us remember, as before, that the good of the whole is paramount, and that individual suffering for the good of the whole is secondary.

What can we do to turn these people to the light?Music and physical education alone are not enough to achieve the goal.The first education we have next is arithmetic, then geometry, and then astronomy.A related discipline is abstract harmony (not harmony of sound).These courses are only a preparation for the study of dialectics.Dialectics is the highest science which leads the intellect to consider the ultimate goal: the idea of ​​the good... Look at Plato, he took a cave as a metaphor for human thinking and cognition, and thought that what we see with our eyes, hear with our ears, smell with our nose, taste with our tongue, and touch with our fingers are not the real world itself, but just a world created by us. A virtual image created by our sensory perception, smell, taste, touch and other organs in partnership.A virtual image is just a virtual image, we don’t want to be serious with him—but when he expressed this virtual image world, he came together with Wang Yangming strangely.

As we said earlier, Neo-Confucianist Lu Jiuyuan shouted: the universe is my heart, and my heart is the universe.Wang Yangming yelled this sentence again with another word: My nature is self-sufficient! When it comes to Plato, he firmly believes that knowledge is not taught to us from outside by others, it is not acquired, nor is it spontaneously produced from the soul, but it is inherent in the soul, or innate. It exists in our soul, but it is in a latent state, like a dream. We cannot know what is behind us through the image on the cave wall unless we turn around; we cannot know that the sun is the master of all things unless we are pulled out of the cave.

Even if our nature is self-sufficient, knowledge is already sleeping in our hearts, but how does this have something to do with goodness? Plato used his daily metaphor to explain this reason. He believes that the real world is actually false and illusory, and there is a real rational world outside this illusory real world.The idea of ​​goodness in the rational world is like the sun in the real illusory world, which really exists and can trigger the cognitive function of our soul. Therefore, Socrates, Plato, and Wang Yangming got together and jointly launched the theory of virtue. There are three points of view in this argument:

No one wants to be evil. Virtue is knowledge. All virtues are one. Regarding these three points, there are also three arguments: 1.All people desire only good things —Therefore no one desires evil.To do evil is to act in a way that produces evil.Therefore, no one wants to do this.Thus, when someone does evil, he doesn't mean it. 2.All men desire only good things —Therefore everyone can do good if he can do it.If he does not, it is because he does not know how to do good.Virtue leads to good things.Virtue, then, is the knowledge of the good. 3.Virtues refer to things that are good in specific circumstances

—Everyone desires the good under all circumstances.If they fail to get good things, it is because they do not know what good things are.Therefore, as long as a person knows what is good, he can only be virtuous in any situation.For all virtue depends on one thing—knowledge of good things.Therefore, all virtues are ultimately one. If we sum up the three arguments of Socrates and Plato, there is only one sentence: you know, you will do it.You don't know, you want to do it and you don't know how to do it.And this is exactly what Wang Yangming said about the unity of knowledge and action:

and so on. In short, everyone said the same thing.