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Essay / The allegory of the cave: relationship between human senses and virtual environments
Table of contentsIntroductionThe philosophical point of viewSummary of the allegory of the caveInterpretationConclusionIntroduction Have you ever wondered how real our world is? How does this make people feel? How do they develop a sense of being part of the natural world? What is the relationship between human senses and virtual environments? Philosophers and scientists have emphasized the illusory nature of this world for centuries. For human perception, sensations are necessary for the brain to receive the information necessary for survival. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayThe senses feed the brain with data. We all grew up knowing the five traditionally recognized senses: hearing, smell, vision, taste and touch. Despite the general belief, human senses are not limited to the five senses that bring information from the outside world, but there are also senses that bring information from the inner world. Information from the inner world can alert you to pain, hunger, thirst, balance, etc. Therefore, the senses can be divided into external and internal senses. The basic principle of external senses is that a sense is any system that responds to physical phenomena. and corresponds to a point in the brain. So, the basic senses include the following: pressure, itching, hunger, thirst, the ability to distinguish cold from hot, the ability to know where the limbs of your body are, the ability to control movements of your muscles, the sense of time, etc. The senses are the source of all our knowledge of external material reality. We cannot know anything about the forms of matter or the forms of movement but only with our senses. The internal senses are mind, intellect, opinion, imagination and feeling. The philosophical point of viewThe French philosopher René Descartes, has been considered the “father of modern philosophy”. In 1637 his book Discourse on the Method contains the expression "Cogito, ergo sum" which means "I think before being" was the main term for applying one's doubt to anything to see if anything remains in the end . He says that he necessarily exists if he thinks and, in his opinion, cannot prove that other minds can exist, but only his own. In Meditations on First Philosophy 1641, he conceived that the mind differs and is made of a different substance from the body. , although it appears that they interact with each other. He believes that the spirit is separate and could exist without the body. Descartes raises questions about human knowledge. He was skeptical and doubtful of all human sensory experiences, because our senses could be illusions or products of hallucinations. Within his theory and beliefs, truth and the treasure of the mind are innate ideas. According to his way of thinking, there are three different types of ideas: innate ideas, external ideas, and ideas he created and reversed. He claims that the senses cannot be trusted and that the only thing we can be aware of is the soul. He argues that the physical world cannot exist if sensory and phenomenal experience is the only path to reality. However, if physical science were a guide to reality, then the phenomenal world would not exist. He disagrees that humans are directly related to physical objects. By looking at any object, humans cannot directly perceive and understand the worldexternal, because they only recognize the phenomenal qualities coming from the sensory fields. "Dubium sapientiae initium - Doubt is the origin of wisdom" - René Descartes Contrary to Descartes' theory and according to the principles of the modern philosopher and empiricist John Locke, innate ideas do not exist in the mind but only in sensory knowledge. He insists that if the human mind had innate ideas, then everyone who had a mind should be aware of them. But he says it's true for people to understand something, they need to be taught and some never learn. Also, for him, innate ideas cannot be innate if the mind cannot become aware of them. The senses have the ability or predisposition of the mind to receive and perceive ideas. He calls these ideas sensations that occur or are perceived in this way in the mind. Therefore, the external senses receive ideas through the stimulation of external objects. In this condition, the soul will remain passive as long as the body is affected by the external senses, because the soul cannot change the way it receives or prevent the perception of the idea. To summarize, his aim was to study the origin of human knowledge and his conclusion is that all this knowledge comes from sensory experience and that the mind has no innate ideas but only sensory knowledge. On the other hand, in 1710, around 20 years later, the philosopher George Berkeley criticized Locke's theory of mind-independent and mind-dependent sensory qualities and casual realism. He believes that knowledge comes from experience, but in a different way. He criticized Locke's view on the existence of the external world and, in his opinion, things arising from the senses cannot be reality. In A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge (1710), he says: "...number is so obviously relative and dependent on the understanding of people, that it is strange to think that anyone could give it a absolute existence without the mind. We say a book, a page, a line, etc. ; all of these are also units, although some contain several of the others. And in each case it is clear that unity refers to a particular combination of ideas arbitrarily assembled by the mind. is idealism, the view that physical objects do not exist. Berkeley believes that there is no world without the mind and that all objects that humans experience in their lives are mind-dependent ideas. Similarly, British philosopher David Hume held the same view as Berkeley that humans do not experience mind. directly to the outside world. But he was skeptical and still disagrees with Berkley's idealism that physical objects do not exist. Hume connects the rationalism of Descartes and the empiricism of Locke to prove that humans acquire knowledge from both, which comes from external stimuli and innate ideas. In 1748, Hume published “Inquiry into Human Understanding.” He emphasizes that innate ideas are not useful to the outside world and all useful knowledge comes from experience. He says that interpretations in the human mind are made by habit, instinct and thought, not by perception of the external world, and that the facts that the human mind can understand are also made by the effect. Furthermore, he believes that there are thoughts in the mind, but he rejects Descartes' theory that there should be a thinker. He found no evidence to prove that the human mind is a non-physical substance or that it exists separate from the body. InFurthermore, he rejects science and maintains that knowledge cannot be linked to metaphysical truth. According to him, reality emerges subjectively, thanks to the perception of ideas. 2,500 years ago, the Greek philosopher Plato was convinced that the body and the mind were made of different substances. He claimed that the mind is rational and can lead to truth. Instead, it is impossible to think that anything humans have experienced via the senses could be true because they can easily be deceived. Plato says he cannot trust the senses because people can confuse imagination with reality. It proves that people often delude themselves or confuse one object with another. For example, if we take a stick straight out into the water, it may appear bent. In the 5th century BCE, The Allegory of the Cave, which was presented by the Greek philosopher Plato, in his work "Republic", had a theory that concerned human perception. The allegory has been described as eternal because it is a reflection of our soul, due to education and its lack on our nature. Plato's allegory has many meanings and theories, and the story below will explain to you the truth between illusion and the real world, connected through the ancient representational space both metaphorically and literally.Summary of the allegory of the caveThis allegory tells us about a cave, under the earth, there are people or "prisoners" chained since their childhood, in such a way that they can only see the wall in front of them. They cannot look back either to the right or to the left. Behind them is a huge fire. Between the "prisoners" and the fire is a raised walkway, on which other people carry various statues of plants, animals, etc. So whatever appears behind their back is represented as a shadow on the wall. These people throughout their lives, the only things they have seen are the shadows of things, and they feel like the shadows they see on the wall are the real or "real" things. In addition, the echo that comes from the statue carries every time they speak, the "prisoners" believe that these words or these echoes come from the shadows. If one of the cave's "prisoners" manages to escape the cave, if he manages to climb into the sunlight, he will see real things, the real world which is not just contained in the shadows, as he had learned before. He would realize the deception he had experienced while he was in the cave. He will realize that the other “prisoners”, still chained to the cave, are immersed in illusions. Once the freed prisoner is able to see the sun, speak and realize the truth, he would not want to return to the cave to help and free the "prisoners", but he would be obliged to do so. back at the cave, he cannot get used to the darkness, he tries to teach, to "open" their eyes and free them, telling them the truth that the perception of their world was a illusion and that the real world exists but coming out of the cave into the light of day, is not a success. Because they are used to the darkness and shadows in the cave, they do not want to see other things, things "unreal" for them, and according to Plato, if they were capable of tending hand, they would kill anyone who tried to get them out.InterpretationThe “prisoners” who have been chained from the legs to the neck, are unable to turn their bodies or even their heads, so they can neither move nor see anything around. them. It is very important to limit their optical and mental horizon and only show them what the bearers of the statue want them to see. Who are these people and what are they doing to them? Thisare people who carry different things such as animals, statues, plants, etc. and they hold whatever they want, manipulating the “prisoners”. And they can only see the shadows of real objects, and not actually the real object, which means for example that we "receive" the shadow of education, but that is only the idea of that and not its real side, which exists. . Additionally, the transporters knew that the prisoners could not see the exact colors or shapes of objects because the wall was cracked and different, some objects appeared in front of other things. So the transporters weren't just fooling the prisoners in the dark. shadows, but it also seems that the “false” shadows are the education system, which today has intentionally remained in the shadows. As an example: imagine 5 year old children who are about to go to kindergarten, the system automatically straps them down, so the children cannot move or learn but only play with their games. But if they had a different system for them, at the age of 10, their mental stage would have had some knowledge and it could develop differently. While the statue bearers hold their items and move quickly behind the fire, the prisoners can't even concentrate and see what the number is, it makes me think of television and cinema these days and express my concerns over our society which does not allow us to understand and think about anything, because it moves very quickly and if we want to analyze something and think about it, it takes time. When they are constantly moving and changing the figures on the wall very quickly, how is it possible to connect different things that don't make sense? They are mentally disconnected from the substance of things. They are always walking around, moving objects that hold, to prevent others from thinking and doing things, voluntarily of course, because they deliberately act and behave this way, for their own personal gain. In 1957, in New Jersey, United States, an experiment by social psychologist James McDonald Vicary took place in many cinemas and theater spaces. Coca-Cola and the popcorn companies participated in the experiment, which is what it is: it exposed moviegoers to very rapid flashes of an image from "Hungry?" - Eat popcorn and drink Coca Cola, to see if concession sales will increase. His experiment was actually very successful because it increased sales by 57.5% for popcorn and 18.1% for Coca-Cola. In conclusion, this hidden message had an impact on the minds of humans, and even today, these secret messages are on a larger scale, controlling the human being. Similar to Plato's theory, images move so quickly in front of them, influencing and controlling the power of people's mental and emotional behavior. Due to their manipulative actions, the “prisoners” of Plato’s theory are, in other words, our generation today. In the Allegory, the shadows on the wall are only the reflection of the real objects and the sound is not the real sound comes from the objects, but from the statue bearers. In addition to the above, when the statue bearers acted and moved, they also spoke at the same time. If we consider that the cave is an acoustic space, the sound has been multiplied and echoed, due to the structural form, like a closed underground space, their noise, uncontrolled and very loud, clearly has an impact on the atmosphere. people rest in the cave. Similarly, the environment of public spaces today is similar, which causes confusion in the minds of humans and does not allow them to think clearly. By..