Following is taken from Plato’s Republic Book VII (translated by C. D. C. Reeve) SOCRATES: Next, then, compare the effect of education and that of the lack of it on our nature to an experience like this. Imagine human beings living in an underground, cavelike dwelling, with an entrance a long way up that is open to the light and as wide as the cave itself. They have been there since childhood, with their necks and legs fettered, so that they are fixed in the same place, able to see only in front of them because their fetter prevents them from turning their heads around. Light is provided by a…