In a cave sits a group of prisoners detained
with their faces turned towards the inner wall.
From the entrance of the cave the sun is shining and casting shadows on the wall in front of the prisoners.
These shadows are the only things the prisoners have ever seen, and will for them represent reality.
The shadow world is all that exists for the prisoners, and they talk to each other about the things they see.
If any of the prisoners could free himself
and escape out into the real world - he would
immediately be dazzled by the sun, which he had never seen before.
When his eyes got accustomed to the light he would see that what he believed to be reality
was merely shadows, or copies, of something more real.
We are all these prisoners, Plato said, trapped in our material world. 
What we think of as reality is actually only shadows there of.
