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[[quoteright:350:[[Literature/TheRepublic https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/platonic_cave.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[[Franchise/TheMatrix ''Free your mind.'']]]]

->''"When I made a shadow on my windowshade\\
They called the police and testified\\
But they're like the people chained up in the cave\\
In the allegory of the people in the cave by the Greek guy."''
-->-- '''Music/TheyMightBeGiants''', "No One Knows My Plan"

In Creator/{{Plato}}'s [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_Cave famous allegory]] from ''Literature/TheRepublic'', reality is not directly perceived. We are tied down, deep in a cave, in front of a fire, unable to see ourselves or anyone else, only their shadows; and as we see the shadows cast by cut-out forms dance and interact, we believe the shadows to be ourselves, and the walls of the cave to be the world. If a prisoner from the depths of the dark cave were to suddenly be released to the outside, they would be BlindedByTheLight of the real world.

A Platonic Cave setting is one in which the cave is shown to be artificial. It doesn't have to be a cave; the person could be trapped in a dark dreamland, a drugged trance, or shrouded in an illusory alternate reality. Stories in this setting frequently have to do with peeling back layers of darkness, trying to get closer to reality. Expect this trope to show up often in media inspired by UsefulNotes/{{Gnosticism}}.

A CuckooNest plot uses this as part of a single episode's story. The EpiphanicPrison similarly uses an obscured nature of reality to trap people.

The term can sometimes be used as a synonym for "artificial reality", as in the case of ''Franchise/StarTrek'''s holodeck. One may GoMadFromTheRevelation of what is outside the cave in a CosmicHorrorStory.

Compare {{Cyberspace}}. May overlap with LotusEaterMachine.

'''Beware of spoilers beyond this point.'''
----
!!Examples:
[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
* ''Anime/TheBigO''. [[MindScrew Maybe]]. [[GainaxEnding Possibly]]. [[TomatoInTheMirror Could be]].
* In ''Anime/DigimonAdventure'', the "cave" is a cave. Matt, Sora and arguably Kari and Ken (Dark Ocean) all get stuck in the same cave that only exists because of their insecurity and sadness.
* ''Anime/ErgoProxy'' : The domes.
* Referenced in the [[http://www.metrolyrics.com/aura-lyrics-hack-sign.html lyrics for Aura's song]] in Anime/DotHackSign.
* In ''Anime/PaleCocoon'', humanity is dwelling in great underground complexes restoring and filing data from the [[AfterTheEnd world how it used to be]], mainly videos and an pictures. Surfacing is strictly forbidden. [[spoiler:Bonus points for having the complexes be on the Moon, not Earth, which has been perfectly fine all along.]]
* ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagicaTheMovieRebellion'': The entirety of [[spoiler:Homura's Witch Barrier]] is this.
* ''Anime/RevolutionaryGirlUtena'' heavily implies that Ohtori Academy is something like this, with two characters, [[spoiler:Akio and Anthy]] implied to have been there for centuries. In this case it also serves as a metaphor for adulthood, with "graduation" being symbolic of leaving childhood.
* In ''Anime/ShamanicPrincess'', the cave is Tiara's perception of her friends. As the show gets into exploring the nature of the "true self," and it becomes increasingly difficult to tell who is an illusion, who is under outside influence, who's being forced to try to kill her, and who is "genuine". There are multiple exchanges that go more or less like this:
-->'''Tiara:''' "Are you the real character name here?"\\
'''Other character:''' "I am me."
* ''Anime/{{Shelter|2016}}'': The virtual world of that Rin lives in seems like an idyllic place, considering Rin can create whatever landscape she wants. But it's also a very lonely one, as she's the only living thing populating it. The later half of the short film shows why this is: the world we've seen Rin in is actual a dream-like place with her physical body being protected and sustained by a spaceship. Said spaceship was built by Shigaru in an attempt to save his only daughter from being killed via an apocalyptic planetary impact.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* ''ComicBook/TheInvisibles'', where our universe is the intersection between two others. When someone is taken to The Invisible College, they are told "Imagine the world is the pattern on the wallpaper...well, now we're in the wall."
* ''ComicBook/MorningGlories'', played very literally.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Fan Works]]
* ''Fanfic/ProdigalSon'': Discussed with between Artemisia and Hiccup in [[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10699391/12/Prodigal-Son Chapter 12]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyANewGeneration'': The cave is the earth pony settlement of Maretime Bay. With the exception of Sunny Starscout, all residents believe that unicorns and pegasi are "the enemy" and that they possess dangerous magical abilities, even though they lost those powers long ago. The primary perpetrator is Canterlogic, a supplier of defensive gear that holds an annual presentation showcasing its items while emphasizing the danger that unicorns and pegasi pose. Sunny is able to interrupt the presentation and deliver a pro-unity speech but is unsuccessful in persuading the crowd. A possible culprit could be the implied lack of travel in or out of Maretime Bay that left it unexposed to differing viewpoints.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films — Live-Action]]
* ''Film/TheThirteenthFloor'': The cave is a virtual reality simulation inside of another virtual reality simulation.
* Discussed in ''Film/AfterTheDark''. Zimit compares James to the observer-of-shadows, as a way of insulting James' intelligence. [[spoiler:The ending depicts Zimit as equally blind, because his egoistical disdain for emotions means he cannot understand James and Petra's love- or [[GreenEyedMonster the reason why]] it angers him so much]].
* The ending of the movie ''Film/{{Brazil}}''. The "cave" is the main character's own mind after going insane under [[ColdBloodedTorture torture]].
* Independent film ''Film/{{Cafe}}'' has people spending most of the film inside the café. It turns out the café (and possibly the world outside) is a computer program, with a [[LittleMissAlmighty quirky little girl]] as the program's avatar. It's a [[{{Pun}} Platonic Café]], if you will.
* ''Film/DarkCity1998'': The cave is an alien spaceship/laboratory made up to look like an American city ca. the 1930s.
* ''Film/{{Dogtooth}}'': The siblings have never left their house since they were born and don't have contact with people from outside. The reality they know is a fiction their parents created to isolate then from the real world.
* ''Film/ElTopo'' takes a very literal interpretation of this trope.
* ''Film/{{eXistenZ}}'': The cave is the virtual reality game. However, this trope is subverted when it turns out that [[spoiler:transCendenZ is just as fake as eXistenZ]]. And the people who want to destroy the cave? Insane terrorists who want to [[CulturePolice stop you from playing video games]].
* ''Film/ExMachina'': Discussed by Caleb, but not by name, when he teaches Ava the idea of a person who knows absolutely everything about color, but has never actually seen it as her only source of information is a black and white television. At the end, Ava ascends into the sunlight, leaving the other "prisoners" behind--a direct reference to Plato's Allegory of the Cave. Visually underpinned in the last scene by showing the shadows of pedestrians on a sidewalk.
* ''Film/{{Inception}}'': The caves are dreams, which are oftentimes impossible to discern from reality.
* ''Film/TheIsland2005'': The clones get freed at the end, coming out of the underground facility into the sun.
* In a similar vein, ''Film/LogansRun'' has people trapped in a walled city with no concept of what the world around them is like. Subverted in that they know there is something outside the city, but their concept of what it is happens to be completely skewed.
* ''Film/TheMatrix'': The Matrix; so in this case, the "cave" is a giant computer program. Later, Cypher subverts this by claiming that "reality" is merely a subjective-relative state post-empirical evidence, which drops down on one's perspective and ideals. Thus, the Matrix can very much be the real world.
* ''Film/SourceCode'': A soldier is sent back in time in a military-crafted pod that is integrated with various electronic inside of it that require his maintenance. [[spoiler:Later he discovers that the entire pod is an illusion created by his own mind while his severely damaged body is in a comatose state [[BrainInAJar hooked into a machine]].]]
* Partial example: ''Film/TheyLive'', in which radio signals are beamed into our brains, causing us to see things inaccurately.
* ''Film/THX1138'': The cave is the entire underground city, and the final scene [[spoiler:where THX climbs the ladder and escapes into the sun]] is a clear reference to the "rough ascent" and transcendence as described in the allegory.
* This is one of the interpretations of the entirety of ''Film/TotalRecall1990'', and the film also heavily implies that this is indeed the setting after Quaid's dream implant. Since it is an adaptation of Philip Dick (see below)...
* ''Film/TheTrumanShow''. The "cave" is a town-sized TV show soundstage.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Literature]]
* Many tales by Creator/HPLovecraft in the Franchise/CthulhuMythos are about humans not being truly aware of the power of the cosmos before us, and all of us living in a pseudo reality apart of the truth of existence, and that learning that existence will drive you insane, [[GoMadFromTheRevelation as the human mind cannot comprehend what is outside of the allegorical cave]]. In one story, it is revealed that the world we know could actually be a Cave within a Cave, as the whole universe is the dream of Azathoth. He is kept asleep by aliens playing music, if he were to ever wake up even the [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]] don't know what would happen.
* The ''modus operandi'' of Creator/PhilipKDick. Many, many, '''many''' of his stories involve counterfeit worlds or unreliable representations of reality, often as a TomatoInTheMirror reveal:
** ''Eye in the Sky'' has the main characters trapped inside solipsist manifestations of the main characters' minds, where reality bends to the ConfirmationBias of their subjective beliefs.
** ''Literature/TimeOutOfJoint'', [[spoiler:similar to ''The Truman Show'', has the main character discover his seemingly-idyllic suburban '50s life is a sham created by the military.]]
** In ''Literature/TheManInTheHighCastle'', protagonist Mr. Tagomi [[spoiler:concentrates on a piece of art so hard he becomes unmoored from his own reality, where the Axis powers won UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, and briefly wanders into ours.]]
** ''The Penultimate Truth'' features a literal Platonic Cave, where the good little worker bees are in massive underground vaults constructing autonomous weapons while news reports of the eternal war ravaging the surface of the Earth are piped in. [[spoiler:Turns out the war ended a while ago, and those autonomous weapons make great landscapers for the elite who have hoarded all the wealth.]]
** ''{{Literature/Ubik}}'' has Joe Chip discover the time-regressing world he's caught in is actually [[spoiler:his dying dream as he lingers in suspended animation.]] [[MindScrew Maybe]]. [[spoiler: In the last chapter Runciter, who supposedly survived, begins experiencing the ''exact same'' things...]]
** ''{{Literature/VALIS}}'' is outrageous about this, mirroring the author's nervous breakdown, when he believed he was communicating with an alien satellite that tried to convince him the Roman Empire was constructing a fabricated Gnostic reality to trap people's souls and make them forget that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ happened very recently. Amazingly, he then wrote himself into the book as ''the voice of reason'' for the protagonist, pointing out he may just be having a psychotic break.
** The title of an essay Dick wrote on writing, philosophy and everything: "How to build a universe that doesn't fall apart two days later", tells worlds about his mindset.
* InvertedTrope in ''Literature/TheDivineComedy''; the souls of the Moon are so pearly and faint that Dante mistakes these real people for shadow. Beatrice has to show the child-like Dante that he faces no illusions, but true reality.
* The same allegory is made with a keyhole instead in ''Literature/FlowersForAlgernon'', as Charlie muses about how different he is after the serum.
-->'''Charlie''': I have often reread my progress reports and seen the illiteracy, the childish naiveté, the mind of low intelligence peering from a dark room, through a keyhole, at the dazzling light outside. I see that even in my dullness that I knew I was inferior, and that other people had something I lacked - something denied me. In my mental blindness, I thought it was somehow connected to the ability to read and write, and I was sure that if I could get those skills I would automatically have intelligence too.\\
\\
[[IJustWantToBeNormal Even a feeble-minded man wants to be like other men.]]
%%* Used in Shelley's ''Literature/{{Frankenstein}}'' in the Creature's narrative.
* In ''Literature/TheGreatGodPan'', the scientist responsible for the whole plot did the experiment because he believed in this theory, and wanted to expose part of the "real" reality to ours. Whereas this is true or not is not specified, but given the fact that an Eldritch Abomination is running around it is likely so.
* ''Heaven'' by Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen happens mostly in the real world, but it involves LotusEaterMachine "worlds", and contains one scene like this. An initiate to the deeper secrets of the religion setting up these fantasy worlds is shown inside one like them and then returned to the office where he was. His instructor argues that the virtual reality he experienced was real, and he disagrees. He says that what is really real is ''this'', meaning his surroundings, at which point he's awoken and realizes that was actually another simulation, used just in order to make a point when he'd start going on about it being more real than the first one.
* In the ''Literature/HorusHeresy'' novel ''A Thousand Sons'', various Imperial authorities hold the Council of Nikaea, debating whether or not to allow the Astartes Legions to employ PsychicPowers. Magnus the Red, primarch of the titular legion and one of the most powerful sorcerers in the Imperium, gives a speech in favor of psykers, using the Platonic Cave as an allegory and describing how a man who escaped it to view the true nature of reality returned to free his fellows and was praised for his wisdom. Unfortunately the Emperor, who is doing his damnedest to ''keep'' humanity in the "cave" because [[TheseAreThingsManWasNotMeantToKnow he knows what's outside it]], rules against Magnus and issues an edict forbidding the use of sorcery. It's also noted by the chapter's viewpoint character Ahriman that Magnus embellished the story as it is remembered in the 31st Millennium - instead of leading the other men to enlightenment, the man who escapes and returns to the cave is ''killed'' by the others, foreshadowing the fate of the Thousand Sons after they defy the edict.
* In Creator/IsaacAsimov's ''Literature/IRobot'', the story "Literature/{{Reason}}" revolves around a robot who becomes convinced that the space station on which he works is his entire universe, and the duties he performs on the station [[CargoCult are rites for a deity]]. The humans who oversee the station are unable to convince him otherwise, and their stories of a large planet with billions of people are dismissed as delusions they were given by 'the Master' to make their own lives seem meaningful. At the end of the story their relief workers reassure them that Earth is in fact still there, but the story ends before they physically leave its confines.
* ''Literature/TheMachineStops'' is, when you strip off all the science fiction, precisely the story Plato told. Except, maybe, for the ending.
* The protagonist of William Gibson's book ''Literature/{{Neuromancer}}'' is at one point inside a virtual reality program, sitting by a bonfire, inside something very reminiscent of a cave.
* Creator/RobertHeinlein's short story "They" has the protagonist catching on to the fact he's in a cave when someone running the world messes up and it's raining outside one window and sunny outside another. They send in a psychologist to try to convince him that he's schizophrenic.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
* ''Series/BabylonFive'':
** While being interrogated in "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E08AndTheSkyFullOfStars And the Sky, Full of Stars]]", Sinclair is [[spoiler:trapped in a cybernet chair in which he experiences an alternate reality]].
** In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS02E06SpiderInTheWeb Spider in the Web]]", Abel Horn is turned into a cybernetically controlled assassin by telepathically locking his mind at his moment of death, so this becomes his reality.
** In "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS02E08ARaceThroughDarkPlaces A Race Through Dark Places]]", Bester is telepathically tricked into thinking that he has completed his mission.
** Londo is trapped in a telepathic drug-induced reality by G'Kar in "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS03E06DustToDust Dust to Dust]]".
** Sheridan possibly spends some time in one [[spoiler:when he dies on Z'ha'dum]]. He only gets out of it when he comes up with something worth living for.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** The Matrix in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin The Deadly Assassin]]", [[spoiler:the eponymous Creator/MCEscher-esque setting, custom-made by the Master and PoweredByAForsakenChild, or Adric]] in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS19E1Castrovalva Castrovalva]]", and the alternate realities in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E7TheCelestialToymaker The Celestial Toymaker]]" and "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS6E2TheMindRobber The Mind Robber]]".
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS13E4TheAndroidInvasion "The Android Invasion"]] has [[spoiler:the fake Earth]].
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E3Gridlock "Gridlock"]]: The motorway. No one wants to talk about the ElephantInTheRoom: no one's seen any sign of the authorities since the traffic jam began, and all of the exits are closed, because the people on the motorway and in the undercity are the only people left alive on the entire planet.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E8SilenceInTheLibrary "Silence in the Library"]]/[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E9ForestOfTheDead "Forest of the Dead"]]: The "cave" is the Library's computer system. Thanks to the signatures of 4,022 people saved to the hard drive for their own safety, the computer core, a little girl who underwent BrainUploading, cannot remember or realize that her world is a computer simulation because of the lack of memory space.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice "Amy's Choice"]]: One of the worlds presented to the Doctor, Amy, and Rory is the Cave, being AllJustADream, with the other one being the real world. [[spoiler:Actually, both worlds are false, making it a double cave]].
%%* The setting of ''Series/LifeOnMars2006''... maybe.
* ''Series/ThePath'': Cal tells the story of Plato's original allegory, which Meyerism apparently agrees with, their "ladder" being the path of the title that leads "into the light" from the cave.
* ''Series/RedDwarf'': In "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonVBackToReality Back to Reality]]", the characters wake up to find they have apparently been in an immersive computer game and when outside the game, they have very different identities. However, they later discover this itself is an alternative reality created by a predatory despair squid in an attempt to drive them to suicide.
* The Shibuya in ''Series/{{Sh15uya}}'' is explicitly stated to be a virtual replication in the opening of the show.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'':
** In "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS2E3ElementaryDearData Elementatry, Dear Data]]", a holographic Professor Moriarty discovers that he's a character in a holodeck fantasy, and it even gets down to the point where he is questioning the memories and personality he was programmed with, rejecting them for a chance at a new identity and existence. When Picard fails to live up to his promise, the follow-up episode "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E11ShipInABottle Ship in a Bottle]]" has Moriarty trapping Picard and Data in one of these briefly leading Picard to muse that [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall their own reality might be a Platonic Cave]].
** Picard is trapped in another in "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS5E25TheInnerLight The Inner Light]]", experiencing an entire lifetime of a [[spoiler:long-dead]] alien named Kaylen, believing it to be reality.
** Riker is trapped in a two-layer cave in "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS4E8FutureImperfect Future Imperfect]]", first being made to think he's in the future and suffering from amnesia, and then being made to believe that '''that''' was a holodeck simulation by his captors, the Romulans. In reality, it was a dual-cave created by [[spoiler:a child alien who took up a role in both cave simulations]].
** Riker finds himself in yet another in "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E19FrameOfMind Frame of Mind]]", as he is constantly shifting between two separate realities. In one he is on the ship acting in a play, in the other he is a patient/prisoner on an alien world. The episode centers on Riker slowly losing grip on reality as he tries to figure out which reality is real and which is a Platonic Cave.
* The ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episode "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS04E19HardTime Hard Time]]" deals with the fallout of O'Brien having been forced into a Platonic Cave as punishment by an alien species. In his cave, he was forced to experience 20 years' worth of memories of being a prisoner.
* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'':
** In both "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS2E18DeathWish Death Wish]]" and "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS3E10TheQAndTheGrey The Q and the Grey]]," the Q create a representational reality that reflects the basic ideas of the Q Continuum for us mere mortals (though they don't try to fool the humans into thinking it's real, it at least suggests that there is more to reality than they're capable of handling).
** Several episodes dealt with fictional holodeck characters gradually coming to understand that their entire existence is within a cave from the point of view of the main cast. This includes holodeck representations of Leondardo da Vinci ("[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS4E10ConcerningFlight Concerning Flight]]"), and the entire town of Fair Haven ("[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS6E11FairHaven Fair Haven]]").
* In the ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' episode [[Recap/SupernaturalS02E20WhatIsAndWhatShouldNeverBe "What Is And What Should Never Be"]], Dean struggles to recognize that the Wishverse is not real and was only a fantasy created to allow the djinn to drain his blood.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Music]]
* TheOhHellos [[SubvertedTrope subvert]] this in "The Truth Is A Cave." The narrator of the song ''thinks'' that reality is this trope. However, in the song, the [[UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}} world's higher reality is knowable]] and he is in denial about that--until the search for truth proves fruitless.
--> "In the silence I heard [[{{God}} you]] calling out to me..."
* The rock band ''Queen'' asked "Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?" in their song ''Bohemian Rhapsody''.
* "Right Where It Belongs", the final track of Music/NineInchNails' ''With Teeth'', is about questioning both reality and yourself, as sung in the chorus.
-->''What if all the world you think you know\\
Is an elaborate dream?\\
(...)What if you could look right through the cracks\\
Would you find yourself\\
Find yourself afraid to see?''
* The music video for Music/CaravanPalace's "Comics" features a quirky take of the myth, following the daily lives of people [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext who solely get around on all fours like animals]] and facing the ground, all except for [[MalevolentMaskedMen a single woman in a mask who watches over them with ominous authority]]. A trio of citizens come across a puddle on the street that reflects the sky, leading them to instead face upward in amazement, [[YankTheDogsChain only for the masked woman to discover them and reimpose her authority by flipping them back down]]. However, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere it doesn't stop them from all abandoning her]] and leaving her powerless.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening''. Reality itself is the "cave," a "fallen" portrayal of the limitless wonder of the Supernal Realms. And even for those who manage to break the ropes and turn around to look at the way out, there are demiurges guarding the mouth of the cave, and a trench before you can even get to them.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]
* In ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'', it is heavily implied that the entire world is merely a [[spoiler: dream world created by entities called "Great Ones". The "Yharnam Sunrise" ending flat out reveals that it is this trope.]]
* ''VideoGame/TheCave'' is themed after the concept, a GeniusLoci EldritchLocation people quest through to retrieve an object of their deepest desire. The place is more of an EpiphanicPrison version of this trope, with some MindScrew elements, as it's shown that the player characters getting what they want inevitably leads to horrible outcomes in the outer world, which is why it's also implied they are not allowed to leave. The good endings imply that the journey through the Cave gives them enough CharacterDevelopment to make positive changes in their lives [[WantsVersusNeeds that they need, rather than the quick fixes they think they want]].
* ''VideoGame/TheEvilWithin'' contains one of the more disturbing examples of this trope. The cave is [[spoiler: the mind of a serial killer that the protagonist has found himself trapped in through the use of device called a STEM system.]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' has this in the form of Tranquility Lane, a VR simulation of a 1950's cul-de-sac neighborhood in which Dr. Stanislaus Braun, depicted as a girl named Betty, repeatedly tortures, kills, and resurrects the residents. The Vaults themselves may qualify for the residents who were born there and have never seen the outside world.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTacticsAdvance'': The cave is the world created by the magical book.
* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening'' contains a rather heart-wrenching take on this trope. The cave is [[spoiler: the entire setting, Koholint Island, which is merely a dream world created by the deity, The Wind Fish. The kicker? All the inhabitants of the island that Link grows to care for and learn about, including the love interest Marin, are also a part of the cave, and should Link leave it, they will all cease to exist. Yet Link cannot continue his quest should he remain in the cave, making the whole story a very bittersweet tale.]]
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty'':
** The Plant setting is blatantly patterned on the workings of ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'', though the player is likely to dismiss it. We later learn the game is a FalseFlagOperation devised by Raiden's handlers to emulate the ''[=MGS1=]'' crisis: a nuclear threat, soldiers in revolt, two [=VIPs=] to rescue, a scientist who knows about Metal Gear's weak point, and various traps which are copy & pasted from the previous game. As a metaphor, the entire plant is just camouflage which crumbles away when Raiden discovers it.
** Raiden's private life can count as one. The government goes to especially cruel lengths to control him, even modeling an employee's looks based on his psyche profile and paying her to act as his girlfriend. Even his career is a hoax.
** Things get even crazier if you really want to take a dive down the [[http://www.metagearsolid.org/reports_mgs2.html rabbit hole]] and uncover all the game's hidden messages. Subscribing to the very well-presented and plausible theories seen here, the entirety of the mission itself could very well be a virtual simulation.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}'''s End Poem, the two narrators refer to life as a "long dream", and the game as a "short dream" within it. When they talk about the ''true'' reality, outside the dreams, the text is garbled and incomprehensible.
* ''VideoGame/OracleOfTao'' has this as the punchline of the original story. Ambrosia is so worried that she might be having a DyingDream, or [[TomatoInTheMirror not be real in the first place]] that she freaks out when God explains the true nature of reality. [[spoiler:She's actually the ''only one'' who exists.]] Oddly enough, things get more interesting ''after'' this happens, and there's an entire PlayableEpilogue based on this new reality.
* ''Literature/TheRing: Terror's Realm'' is about this. [[spoiler:The world which Meg perceives as the [RING] program is actually the real world as it exists since Sadako's reign of terror started. What she perceives as the mundane world is a humanity-wide projection that Sadako is sending out to lull them into a false sense of security.]]
* ''VideoGame/StarOceanTillTheEndOfTime'' reveals that the entire universe is a simulated reality and, consequentially, everyone in it is an AI program.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Webcomics]]
* [[http://www.arthurkingoftimeandspace.com/0255.htm This strip]] from the {{webcomic}} ''Webcomic/ArthurKingOfTimeAndSpace'' has Plato actually ''doing'' this.
* [[http://www.daisyowl.com/comic/2008-07-06 This]] strip from ''Webcomic/DaisyOwl'' has a fly trapped in one.
* ''Webcomic/ExistentialComics'': [[http://existentialcomics.com/comic/222 "Escape from Plato's Cave"]] has the original allegory reimagined as if it were an action movie, with a lot more guns and karate.
* ''Webcomic/{{Tailsteak}}'''s comic [[http://www.tailsteak.com/archive.php?num=32 The Sixth TV]] is an unusual take on the cave, and indeed begins with a quote from Plato.
* ''Webcomic/TowerOfGod'': Bam's cave.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]
* ''WebVideo/FrenchBaguetteIntelligence'': Discussed in ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-UC7v-Ou24 Science vs Ethics Debate]]''. Harry suggests keeping the humanzees on a island where they would be isolated and monitored in secret. When Gringo says that this is immoral, he responds by saying that the humanzee wouldn't care because he wouldn't be aware that he is a prisoner; as he would have no knowledge of the outside world, he would have no desire to leave, thus would be staying there by choice.
-->'''Harry:''' Freedom isn't known, it is felt; and what we feel is defined by the lies that we're fed. As soon as the pandemic ends, you will cherish your "freedom" from the office you called "prison" two years ago. That is what happens when a rat escapes a cage to enter a bigger cage. My point is that if the facility is in the middle of a desert you could let the humanzees roam freely and unsupervised, and yet, they would always choose to come back because they would convince themselves that there is nothing in the world for them. How can you feel trapped when you cannot see the restraints?
* The video [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xj7O8mrO_wY&lc=UgxXeQIzvx4ZnWUCDOp4AaABAg "White Walls"]] reimagines this trope through the lens of the Cthulhu Mythos. One guess as to how it ends.
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[[folder:Western Animation]]
* This turns-out to be the case in ''WesternAnimation/TwelveOunceMouse'' with a very gradual reveal over the first two seasons leading-up to a glimpse of the (maybe) real world in the Season 2 finale.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheDragonPrince'': In Season 2, Lujanne discusses how understanding that one can only ever know one's ''perception'' of reality is central to [[{{Lunacy}} the moon arcanum]].
-->'''Lujanne:''' The arcanum of the moon is about understanding the relationship between appearances and reality. Most people believe that reality is truth and appearances are deceiving. But those of us who know the moon arcanum understand we can only truly know the appearance itself. You can never touch the so-called reality that lies just beyond the reach of your own perception.
* ''WesternAnimation/AnOstrichToldMeTheWorldIsFakeAndIThinkIBelieveIt'' is a StopMotion animated short about Neil, the protagonist who works a SoulCrushingDeskJob. An ostrich visits him in the office and tells him that his whole world is "a lie" and "a sham." Neil eventually discovers that he is a plasticine figure in a StopMotion animated short.
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[[folder:Real Life]]
* Several physicists have suggested ontologies that Plato would have been proud of:
** Cosmologist Paul Davies, along with a good number of other scientists, philosophers and theologians, believes that the universe is nothing more than a very powerful quantum-digital computer. He even proposed an experiment that could be performed pending developments in computer engineering.
** Max Tegmark thinks that only math exists, and that what we perceive as real, is nothing more than equations tricking themselves into thinking that they exist in a real world.
** Probably weirdest of all, after considering the [[http://www.scientificamerican.com/media/pdf/197911_0158.pdf philosophical consequences of the violation of Bell's Theorem]], Bernard d 'Espagnat concluded that the Laws of Physics are nothing more than the shadows of a panentheistic god.
** It was discovered in quantum mechanics that fundamental particles (quarks, electrons, photons etc.) are "point particles", particles which have no physical extension in 3D space and consequently occupy none. This would make atomic structures no longer mostly empty space, but entirely empty space. One proposed solution is that the basis of reality is not matter but information, and that the basis of a particle is a quantity of tiny empty space that has been given certain properties and parameters that effect a spherical radius of miniscule empty space. Who or what is "programming" the universe is naturally very open for debate.
* Pythagoras believed that numbers were the true nature of everything. This became an empirical theory by Isaac Newton, who would codify how to use mathematics to describe physics.
* In a very real sense, we don't perceive anything but shadows. You think you see other people, but that's just electromagnetic waves stimulating your retina. What you hear is just molecular vibrations. What you feel is just pressure picked up by your nerves. Humans do not have one single sense that ''directly'' perceives how we interpret the data we receive from the environment. ''In other words, YouCannotGraspTheTrueForm of everything around you, and what you see is just an illusion created by the brain trying to make sense out of everything.''
* The Balinese believe something very similar to this. Everything we see and experience is a reflection of the real world. The sacred theater of Bali includes ''wayang'' (reflection) plays using flat puppets made of leather behind a lit screen, so all you see is their shadows.
* Some Native American tribe believe this also. To get into the real world, you have to dream. Crazy Horse was one of many holy men known for the ability to be in both worlds at once.
* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_in_a_vat Brain In A Vat,]] a concept where, if your brain was floating in a vat of life-supporting fluid, and wired up to a supercomputer designed to simulate reality, processing output from your brain and responding with appropriate input, there would be absolutely no way at all for you to determine that this was the case.
* Similar to the above is the concept of the Boltzmann Brain. In certain models of the universe, most human brains, likely including your own, would be the result of particles completely by chance crashing together into the shape of a brain rather than being born as part of a human the normal way. These brains would have a complete set of false memories of being human and would die immediately after being born never knowing what happened.
* The color magenta is something your brain makes up when it sees red light and purple light at the same time. There is no "magenta" wavelength.
* The term ''woke'' originally referred to this, using the metaphor of "waking up" to see the world the way it truly is to describe gaining the full-awareness regarding the social injustices present in the world. "Woke" is an African-American variant of "woken" and was coined in its present use in the 2010s by activists trying to promote awareness of police brutality against Black people and other injustice toward the African-American community. Over time the term expanded to also include awareness of other issues such as sexism and transphobia. However, the term now is mainly used ironically by those who are critical of left-wing politics.
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