In the 19th century, John Humphrey Noyes attempted to follow both Plato's The Republic and the Bible to create the perfect society. He founded a commune first in Putney, Vermont in 1838, then in Oneida, New York in 1848. While the community consisted of more than 300 or so members, it is possibly the closest that anyone has ever come to actually creating a Platonic society.

Creating a a doctrine that he called Perfectionism, Noyes sought to implement Plato's ideas of sharing all belongings with the community so that the emphasis of society would be the community rather than the individual. Individuality was something to be abstained from, the only privacy being the tiny individual cells for sleeping in. The community would work, eat and live together, with no discrimination of sex, with the same rights and privileges for all. Members were encouraged to be uniform, and not be special in any way.

Plato saw state regulation as a key part of his ideal republic and Noyes and his 'Guidance Committee' attempted to strictly control all familial ties and social interaction. Children were taken away from their parents as soon as they were weaned and, while they were not kept from knowing the identity of their parents like Plato's Republic suggested, were discouraged from forming any special bond with them.

Noyes and his government also regulated choice of sexual partners, and adolescents were often forced into liaisons with older partners in order to adhere to the Platonic ideal of spreading the love communally. However, this ideal was mixed with the incoming pseudo-science of eugenics and the idea of selective breeding in humans. Suitable partners were coupled up to produce ideal offspring, many of whom were sired by Noyes himself, who saw himself as the ideal man in both Platonic and Christian ideals.

The community at Oneida did not survive for several reasons. The restrictions on family and sexuality were impossible to enforce effectively and the weight of criticism from outside and the established churches was beginning to take its toll. The increasingly criticised community had to depend more and more on the outside world for income and thus Oneida began to assimilate socially and financially. In 1881, the community dissolved itself, becoming solely a silverware production company, and in 1886 John Humphrey Noyes died.

While Noyes was never overt about what inspired the structure of his commune, it undoubtedly was based along Plato's The Republic while incorporating certain Biblical teachings. The biggest difference between Plato's ideal and Oneida was that the former was geared for war and the latter was made up of workers and farmers. The Platonic influence was in Oneida's attempts of social engineering and this was ultimately unsuccessful.