<P> Plato begins by having Socrates ask Glaucon to imagine a cave where people have been imprisoned from birth . These prisoners are chained so that their legs and necks are fixed, forcing them to gaze at the wall in front of them and not look around at the cave, each other, or themselves (514a--b). Behind the prisoners is a fire, and between the fire and the prisoners is a raised walkway with a low wall, behind which people walk carrying objects or puppets "of men and other living things" (514b). The people walk behind the wall so their bodies do not cast shadows for the prisoners to see, but the objects they carry do ("just as puppet showmen have screens in front of them at which they work their puppets" (514a)). The prisoners cannot see any of what is happening behind them, they are only able to see the shadows cast upon the cave wall in front of them . The sounds of the people talking echo off the walls, and the prisoners believe these sounds come from the shadows (514c). </P> <P> Socrates suggests that the shadows are reality for the prisoners because they have never seen anything else; they do not realize that what they see are shadows of objects in front of a fire, much less that these objects are inspired by real things outside the cave which they do not see (514b - 515a). </P> <P> Plato then supposes that one prisoner is freed . This prisoner would look around and see the fire . The light would hurt his eyes and make it difficult for him to see the objects casting the shadows . If he were told that what he is seeing is real instead of the other version of reality he sees on the wall, he would not believe it . In his pain, Plato continues, the freed prisoner would turn away and run back to what he is accustomed to (that is, the shadows of the carried objects). He writes "...it would hurt his eyes, and he would escape by turning away to the things which he was able to look at, and these he would believe to be clearer than what was being shown to him ." </P> <P> Plato continues: "Suppose...that someone should drag him...by force, up the rough ascent, the steep way up, and never stop until he could drag him out into the light of the sun ." The prisoner would be angry and in pain, and this would only worsen when the radiant light of the sun overwhelms his eyes and blinds him . </P>

In the allegory of the cave what did seeing the light do to the prisoner