File talk:Plato's allegory of the cave.jpg

Technically, this is a poor representation of Plato's cave, which worked somewhat differently. The Jade Knight 11:52, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

The shadow should not be a 'copy' of the spectator but of the ideas behind the spectator. What's more, the details (like the shape of the cave, the shape of the mountain-segment) doesn't help the understanding of the concept, much rather they are needless. To be constructive I suggest the usage of a section-like overview instead of the segment. But still it's hard to decide what to show in the shape of the shadow (precisely: what kind of idea). Concerning this problem, I would choose a symbolic depiction of the idea (like the character "I"). Here comes the sketch: [light source]->[idea]->[living people/ppl. of our world -- facing towards the cave wall]->[the shadow of the idea] where the arrows symbolize the direction of the lightest beams of light; And the image should be like this: [a lightbulb], [an edgy "I"], lots of space, [a small guy facing right (and inward) in a huge capital omega char.], [a dimly contoured "I"] So even if not better, this might be more educational. Being unnatural/caricaturistic in populating this image with pre-made illustrations might enphasize the allegoric nature of the concept.