Document Type
Article
Publication Date
8-6-2025
Abstract
This article examines the philosophical significance of nature (ϕύσις) in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. The word is used in the protasis of the conditional clause at 515bc where Socrates proposes to inquire into ‘what the manner of the release and healing from these bonds and this folly would be if in the course of nature (ϕύσϵι) something of this sort should happen to them’. This instance of ‘nature’ has been a matter of philological and philosophical debate, with attention paid principally to the narrow passage of the allegory for reconstructing Plato’s meaning. This article argues from the standpoint of the argument of the dialogue as a whole, showing that a particular reading of ϕύσις coheres with the conception of human nature in the Republic’s moral psychology. The discussion begins with consideration of the difficulties presented by the manuscript tradition, which sees variation in the recording of the clause in question. Then the attempts by scholars to resolve the problem—or else to express their inability to resolve it—are addressed and shown to be unsatisfactory. Finally, an interpretation that connects the mention of ϕύσις with Plato’s conception of the philosophic nature, described in Book 6 of the dialogue, is offered.
Recommended Citation
McDavid, Brennan. “Prison-Breaking from Plato's Cave.” The Classical Quarterly, 2025, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838824000831.
Peer Reviewed
1
Copyright
The author
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Comments
This article was originally published in The Classical Quarterly in 2025. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838824000831