I learned that Plato's "The Allegory of the Cave" and Jean Paul Sartre's "No Exit" shows that our thinking has limits and that it can be influenced from what other people think to what we have to see for ourselves. Plato's and Sartre's characters were both secluded and had limitations on knowledge. The cave men did not believe the freed man that saw the truth about what was going on. They were comfortable with their shackles; they did not care for being free or escaping the shackles that kept them from the knowledge. The characters from "No Exit" were each other's "shackles". They influenced each other's thoughts and they couldn't think for themselves. They were each other's knowledge. The characters did not bother to look further than what was already there. I think that to escape from other people's thoughts of influence, we have to not listen to what the person right next to us has to think or say and we have to think for ourselves.
I also agree that we don't have to listen to the person sitting next to us-- we can have our own opinions and we can think whatever we want. Well, not "whatever" but you get the idea. And I think that's essential to us because we shouldn't be influenced by what other random people say out there.
ReplyDeleteA bit askew from the topic...
Anyway, you did a nice job.