Between the men and the fire is a path on higher ground. Along this path walk other men who are carrying all kinds of objects, perhaps statues of men or animals. They are at a height at which the light of the fire casts a shadow of the object onto the wall the bound men are forced to watch. Because these men have been here their whole lives they believe that the shadows they see are real, and that the noises coming from behind them come from the shadows. Plato goes on to propose what might happen if one of these men was to break free and climb his way out of the cave into the real world. The man would surely be blinded by looking into the light of the fire, but once he got used to it, it wouldn't hurt badly, if at all. The man could then venture outside where then again he would be blinded by the light of the sun. Eventually the man would get used to the new light and come to realize what he had been missing the whole time he was locked in the cave. Plato tells us that the man would most surely want to go back into the cave, but only to persuade others to join him in the newfound light. This, however, would not be easy. The other bound men wouldn't understand about the light and may try to bring the escapee back into the cave. This knowledge would be a tremendous burden on the man. .
All these things Plato talks about are symbols. The cave and the bound men at the bottom represent the people in society; us. Out of routine, we automatically look at things and take them at face value. What we see is has to be the truth. We are constrained by politics, the government and advertising to name a few. An education however, allows us to look beyond the way something appears and break free from our constraints to find, underneath everything, a truth. Sometimes the truth can be blinding, like the man who broke free found out. The Cave also shows how knowing the truth can be a burden, in that those who know it feel obligated to tell others about it, and to try to change the world.
