to tell the other captives of the truth, they laugh at and ridicule the enlightened one, for the only reality they have ever known is a fuzzy shadow on a wall. They could not possibly comprehend another dimension without beholdin! g it themselves, therefore, they label the enlightened man mad. For instance, the exact thing happened to Charles Darwin. In 1837, Darwin was traveling aboard the H.M.S. Beagle in the Eastern Pacific and dropped anchor on the Galapagos Islands. Darwin found a wide array of animals. These differences in animals sparked Darwin on research, which lasted well up to his death, culminating in the publishing of The Origin of Species in 1858. He stated that had not just appeared out of thin air, but had evolved from other species through natural selection. This sparked a firestorm of criticism, for most people accepted the theory of the Creation. In this way Darwin and his scientific followers parallel the escaped prisoner. They walked into the light and saw true reality. Yet when he told the imprisoned public what he saw, he was scoffed at and labeled mad, for all the prisoners know and perceive are just shadows on a wall which are just gross distortions of reality. Darwin walked the path to understanding just like the escaped prisoner in "The Allegory of the Cave." Plato's parable greatly symbolizes man's struggle to reach the light and the suffering of those left behind who are forced to sit in the dark and stare at shadows on a wall. -- Allegory of the Cave Plato illustrates his dualistic theory of reality by his famous Allegory of the Cave, at the beginning of Book VII of the Republic. Now then, says Socrates, as he introduces the allegory, imagine mankind as living in an underground cave which has a wide entrance open to the light. Deep inside are human beings facing the inside wall of the cave, with tbeir necks and legs chained so that they cannot move. They have never seen the light of day or the sun outside ...
