Cave Myths and the Metaphorics of Light: Plato, Aristotle, Lucretius ANDREA NIGHTINGALE What do they want when they want “knowledge”? Nothing more than this: Something strange is to be reduced to something familiar. And we philosophers—have we really meant more than this when we have spoken of knowledge ? What is familiar means what we are used to so that we no longer marvel at it, our everyday, some rule in which we are stuck, anything at all in which we feel at home. Look, isn’t our need for knowledge precisely this need for the familiar, the will to uncover under everything strange, unusual, and questionable something that no longer disturbs us? Is it not the instinct of fear that bids us to know? And is the jubilation of those who attain knowledge not the jubilation over the restoration of a sense of security? —Nietszche, The Gay Science Ancient philosophers used myth and rhetoric to elevate the discipline of philosophy over other modes of wisdom. Indeed, beginning with Plato, they argued that “philosophia” offered not only the highest form of wisdom but a life of eudaimonia. In this essay, I examine the discourses that Plato, Aristotle, and Lucretius used to define and defend the “philosopher.” First, I look at their discussions of wonder and its role in philosophic inquiry. Second, I analyze their narratives of enlightenment, which trace the philosopher’s movement from darkness to light. In particular , I examine the “cave myths” of Plato, Aristotle, and Lucretius . Finally, I compare these myths—which portray the philosopher’s vision of the light—to Parmenides’ movement into darkness to find Being. These philosophers use the tropes of wonder and illumination in their efforts to proarion 24.3 winter 2017 mote very different philosophies. Each philosopher sets forth a distinct metaphorics of light and darkness to valorize his conception of “truth.” plato on wonder and philosophy in the Theaetetus, Plato famously identifies wonder as the origin of philosophy. After a discussion of a series of intellectual puzzles generated by Protagoras and other relativists, the adolescent Theaetetus says: “By the gods, Socrates, I feel overwhelming wonder over what these things are. And sometimes, in truth, I have a horrible sense of vertigo when I examine them (καὶ νὴ τοὺς θεούς γε, ὦ Σώκρατες, ὑπερφυῶς ὡς θαυμάζω τί ποτ᾽ ἐστὶ ταῦτα, καὶ ἐνίοτε ὡς ἀληθῶς βλέπων εἰς αὐτὰ σκοτοδινιῶ). Socrates replies: “My friend, Theodorus seems to have guessed rightly about your nature. For wonder is the pathos of the philosopher. There is no other beginning of philosophy than [wonder]” (Θεόδωρος γάρ, ὦ φίλε, φαίνεται οὐ κακῶς τοπάζειν περὶ τῆς φύσεώς σου. μάλα γὰρ φιλοσόφου τοῦτο τὸ πάθος, τὸ θαυμάζειν: οὐ γὰρ ἄλλη ἀρχὴ φιλοσοφίας ἢ αὕτη), 155c–d. This passage deals not only with the origin of philosophy but with the pathos of wonder. Most scholars have translated “pathos” as the “feeling” of wonder. But, in this passage, pathos is more than a feeling—it is a pain rooted in frustration and anxiety. Theaetetus experiences a disorienting vertigo in the face of questions about perception and knowledge. In fact, if we translate skotodinian more literally, we can say that wonder makes Theaetetus “whirl in the darkness.” Wonder is not just a desire for knowledge: it is a distressing psychic experience.1 But what is it, exactly, that makes one “whirl in the darkness”? Hannah Arendt claims that humans are “question-asking beings” who feel the pathos of wonder. Indeed, people who take philosophical questions seriously must “endure” this pathos. As she puts it: As soon as the speechless state of wonder translates itself into words, it will not begin with statements but will formulate in cave myths and the metaphorics of light 40 unending variations what we call the ultimate questions—What is being? Who is man? What meaning has life? What is death? etc.— all of which have in common that they cannot be answered scientifically . Socrates’ statement “I know that I do not know” expresses in terms of knowledge this lack of scientific answers. But in a state of wonder this statement loses its dry negativity, for the result left behind in the mind of the person who has endured the pathos of wonder can only be expressed as: Now I know what it means not to know; now I know that I do not know.2 Arendt sees wonder as the sudden, preverbal discovery that one is at a loss. It is a response to core existential questions : Why...