 Alright, I'm walking out of the cave, or at least I'm on my way out of the cave, I'm not out of the cave yet. Let's get started with what's happening in the cave. So in the cave we've got shadows and we've got the puppets. So the shadows are just the appearances. And this is highly subjective knowledge. Nobody else has my appearances, everybody has their own appearances. So I'm looking over here, I have this thing here. So the appearances include all the sensory information. Not just the colors, I mean the colors are at least there, but not just the colors. So I've got some greens and some browns for this thing here and I'm going to go over and try and get some more appearances, some more shadows. So I've got the touch and it's rough. And actually some little pokey parts to it, so I've got a little bit of sharpness in there. Right? Oh, there's some thorns, that's the pokey part. There's smell. There's sound so I can knock it, well you can't really hear it, but there is some sound, there's some wrestling. There's some wrestling, want to do it. So all of these are appearances of that thing. That's the shadows. The cut out is the thing itself, is the thing itself. Now this is the subjective part of the knowledge. The only thing I know about that particular thing is subjective experience and in a sense that it's there. So I am sure all of those appearances are from that thing as opposed to that thing, that's a different thing right there. So the appearances, the shadows that I have, that's from that cut out. Appearances change. When the light comes out, the appearances on that will change some more. And when it gets dark it will really change. Right now there's still kind of a low level light, the sun still hasn't fully come out yet. So the appearances are different right now than supposed to later, as opposed to later. Even the smell, if there's more humidity in the air versus less humidity, the smell of that will change depending upon the season, if it's blooming, that appearance will change. So the shadows, it's just the appearances and the cut out is the thing itself. And it's still very subjective knowledge. I still don't know the particular object itself. I think for Plato it's fair to say you don't really know the thing, that particular thing itself. The only thing you can know objectively is form. And the reason is, think back to Russell, right? Russell gave us the distinction between appearance and reality. Shadows are caused by that thing, yeah. But it's distinct from the thing itself. It's caused by that thing. The shadows are caused by that thing, but are distinct from the thing itself. And I can't experience the thing itself. I can't get that thing into my head. I can only, only the appearance, only what it causes is in my head, all right. So the next step in the allegory is the form. It's the form of tree. It's what all and only these things have in common. So it's this tree, any other trees that we've seen along the way. And you notice there's a wide variety of trees along the way, a wide variety. Some have leaves, some have needles, some have a singular trunk, some have multi-trunk. Some are tall, some are short, some are young, some are old. There's a whole wide variety of these trees that we can see if we just go outside and take a look at them. And the form is what they all have in common, all trees, all and only trees. I mean, trees are also plants, right? So plants are a different kind of thing, or not different, but not every plant is a tree. Every tree is a plant, but not every plant is a tree. So it's all and only trees that makes up the form tree. And the form is independent of that thing. And through the use of reason, through the use of reason, I know the form objectively. It's not because, you know, there's this tree out there causing the appearances. No, that's subjective knowledge. It's objective knowledge. I have access using my mind, using reason to the form itself. So now we're outside the cave, we're dealing with the solid object, right, the particular things. And I'm sorry, we're outside the cave, we're dealing with the solid objects and the allegory the solid objects represent the form. So I contemplate form, I learn what I can about the form of tree by finding out what trees have in common, not any particular tree. You know, this is kind of worth pointing at, right, worth mentioning at least for a second. The form of tree does not look like any particular tree. That's a tree. That's a particular tree. Not all trees look like that. As I said, there's a wide variety of these trees. Some are short, some are tall, some are multi-trunk, some are single-trunk, some have leaves, some have needles. The form of tree does not look like any particular tree because it's what trees have in common. The form of tree doesn't look like anything, right, looks like are just appearances. Looks like it's just an appearance. There's an appearance, okay. That looks like a tree but not all trees. Not what all trees have in common. So this is kind of the weird thing about form. If you try to imagine form, try to imagine the form of tree, you're not imagining the form of tree. You're imagining probably a particular tree. I'm going to guess an oak. It's probably the first thing that comes to mind. It looks like an oak but not every tree looks like an oak. And there's even differences amongst oaks when you start looking at the particulars. So again, it's worth reading. The form of tree doesn't look like any particular tree. Now if it's not appearances, Plato is saying, then it's objective knowledge, it's knowledge of the form. Not just that, okay. So the next step, right, so we've got the shadows, that's the appearances. The next step is the puppets, right, that's a particular thing, I went up and felt a particular thing, got a good look at it, that's knowledge of the particular thing, but this is still subjective knowledge. The next step is form, hold on, now we're getting to the object of knowledge. It's because it's not appearances anymore. That's what everything has in common. All and only trees have in common. And that's not an appearance, that's comprehension, that's known through reason and it's objective knowledge. I know the form, not just me or what I think about it, not just an appearance, but I know the form. Okay, so we're still with the allegory. We talk about the shadows, the cutouts, and the solid objects outside. Shadows are the appearances, the cutouts represent particular objects, the solid objects outside represent form. But how does that get us to the sun? How does that get us to the good, the true, and the beautiful? I mean, it seems like a pretty big leap, right, from trees to the sun. Well, it is, it is a big leap. So I mean, this is what Plato has in mind. Now remember, you know, forms are the universal of what everything has in common, or what these things have in common. So we're talking about the form of tree, it's what all trees have in common. It doesn't look like any particular tree, even the ones you see in front of us. These are not the form of tree, these are our particular trees. And there's still a wider variety of trees than what we see here. Okay, so suppose we understand the form of tree, how do we get to the sun? Well, there are more forms beside that, even the form of tree belongs to a form, right, plant. There are more kinds of plants than just trees. There's a wide variety of them. Some have needles, some have leaves, some have stems, some don't, some have trunks, some don't have any of these things at all. Or you know, some don't have stems or leaves at all. Okay, so we have the wider form of plant, which doesn't look like any particular plant. It's what you comprehend, not what you see. Okay, so suppose you have worked your way up from tree to plant, that's great. You're understanding more and more abstraction, more and more meaning, more and more form. Okay, so we have tree to plant, well, plant belongs to a form, right? It's living, it's a living thing. And there are more living things than plants. And we got animals of various kinds, lots of different kinds of animals. We got mammals, we got reptiles, we got fish, we got birds, avids. And you know, it's just the ones that we can see, right? I didn't even talk about the microbial animals, insects, right? These are also animals. So there's a lot that you can do to understand all those forms, even the particular kinds of mammals, dog, cat, horse, particular kinds of reptiles, snake, gecko, salamander, lizard, other kinds of birds, mockingbird, eagle, sparrow, finch, different fish, salmon, trout, tuna. You understand all these forms working from the particular things to their form and working way up in abstraction, from tree to plant to living. Well there are more kinds of things than living things, right? We can start talking about just all of corporeal things, right? We'll be making a bit of a jump here, but yeah, it's a jump. So there's all kinds of corporeal things that are not alive. Rocks, dirt, stars, clouds, mountains, valleys, rivers, oceans. All of these things are not alive, yet they're corporeal. What do all these corporeal things have in common? There's something that they have in common that makes them all and only corporeal things. And then, you know, even corporeal things, we're talking about existing things. This play that's going to say the forms exist. In fact, they're a higher form of existence than the particular things. After all, these particular things come and go, but the form doesn't. And you might have difficulty grasping onto that one, but you know, keep in mind, we've got forms of things that no longer, there's no longer particular cases. So dinosaurs, right over the sledge, in fact, we can see dinosaur tracks. There are no more dinosaurs, but there's still the meaning, the essence of dinosaur. So if we keep working up an abstraction, right, we can have all of the forms. And there's lots of different kinds of forms. We've got mathematics, logic. I mean, just countless forms that consider just within there. And even with mathematics, I mean, if you want to consider all of geometry with the math, that's fine. But there's even more sorts of mathematics beyond geometry. There's just simply the numbers themselves. The relationships between them, working on up from arithmetic to algebra, trigonometry, calculus. There's lots and lots of non-corporeal forms. Non-corporeal means not having a physical existence. And you keep working your way up in abstraction until finally, Plato says, that's when you understand true. Existence, good, beauty. For Plato, these are not four different terms. The good, the true, and the beautiful, and being, right? They're all the same thing. Existence just is truth. Existence just is goodness. Existence just is beauty. And when you understand all of that, you're working your way up in abstraction from the particulars up to the form, to the more abstract, higher up to the forms all the way up. That's how you work your way to the sun. And then that's when you understand everything.