Sigmund Freud, in chapter 2, carefully analyses “children’s play” known as “fort da”. Freud uses the example when a baby has a toy with a string attached, it would throw the toy to a place he cannot see and pulls it back. This example can also be recreated with a game people today know as “peeka boo”. Take a mother trying to play peeka boo with her child for instance. When the mother covers her face with her hand, the child is curious where the face he usually sees went. And once the mother moves her hand to reveal herself, there is a smile on the baby’s face because there she is, right in front of him.
Aristotle’s allegory of the cave states that a man trapped in the cave would not know the shadow of a chair on the wall is a chair because he has never seen it. But once he sees the chair, he would know it’s a chair and make good use of it. Aristotle used the example of a person and the shadow to explain that someone might not be aware of something until he experiences it.
Freud uses his analysis of a baby with his toy to express a similar point as Aristotle and his allegory of the cave – a person cannot experience happiness without first experiencing the opposite. Once the mother of the baby reveals herself, she notices the baby laughing and cheering. That is because the baby never thought of the mother leaving his side until it actually happens. And at that point, the baby realizes what makes him happy. Similarly, Aristotle states that a man does not know what a chair is until he experiences it. In the same sense, if the man were to be happy in the cave, he is not truly happy because he has not experience the outside world. He cannot say he is truly happy because there might be something out there that would make him even happier.
