New Acropolis is an international not-for-profit organisation with branches in over 50 countries. In Australia, New Acropolis was founded in 2004 and is based in Sydney on Pitt Street. It offers weekly courses on philosophical topics and public events every month. The Australian branch of New Acropolis has around 10 regular members and 300 email subscribers.
“We want to encourage people to be aware of their past, the history of humanity,” Mr Orucu said. “It is important to be able to ask questions about ourselves, to be able to deal with our problems, our daily life.”
“We want to promote different kinds of cultures and bring discussion about them. If we learn about each culture and are able to use it in our life, that is great. This is something we are missing in modern life, we are not questioning things, we are accepting without questioning, without understanding. We are all philosophers in our way …”
On Thursday November 7 New Acropolis held a special meeting in celebration of the 2400th Anniversary of Plato.
Yeemon, 32, an ESL Teacher, said: “I was really curious about it, the topic of tonight’s class was interesting. I decided to come for a bit of intellectual stimulation. It was quite a lot of information to digest. Now I have to do a bit more research at home. I am always thinking about life, love, the universe, so this is definitely my kind of thing.”
Atsushi, 28, an economics and public policy consultant, said: “I found the group through Meet Up. In my personal life, I question myself about morals, values … so the philosophical concepts interest me a lot. For example, what Plato did is applicable to our daily life.”
