IONS Founder Edgar Mitchell

Edgar Mitchell during the Apollo 14 Mission

One of the great dreams of explorers is that the frontier of their explorations reveals a panorama of unanticipated breadth, depth, and beauty. For thirty-five years we in the greater community of IONS have witnessed a revolution in human understanding about the nature of consciousness and human capacities that could hardly have been imagined when Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell started our collective quest in 1973.

Everywhere we turn, the frontiers are expanding and fresh insight into human capacities and consciousness find fertile ground—in psychology, medicine, business, education, and numerous other fields. Thirty-five years ago, when IONS began to explore anomalies in the accepted worldviews of the time, who would have imagined how far we would get in advancing the science of mind-body health despite the skepticism of mainstream science that there was a connection between mental activity and the body's healthy functioning.

Since that time, IONS has continued breaking new ground through its research on remission of disease; the effects of meditation; the influence of attitudes, beliefs, intuition, and intention on health; and the relationship between mind and matter—weaving it all into a coherent and compelling vision of our potential.

In 1987, former IONS president Willis Harman wrote Global Mind Change and brought this vision to the general public. It was a benchmark examination of the power of human consciousness to transform planetary conditions and a more potent challenge to the scientific community to move beyond its denial that consciousness is causal. In 1993, IONS collaborated with Turner Broadcasting to launch The Heart of Healing television series, which helped to wake up an entire generation to this emerging science and its relevance not only to healing but also to even bigger questions about the nature and powers of consciousness.

Today we continue to research, write, and publish on themes that take us further and deeper into the emerging frontiers of a world in great transition. Books, reports, and peer-reviewed papers by our research team on consciousness and healing, quantum entanglement, anomalous cognition, and the science of transformation; the largest online media archive of pioneer thinkers and activists; and the editorial team behind Shift magazine and The Shift Report, collectively present emerging evolutionary paradigms, new scientific research, and evidence of global shift.

Our hub in Petaluma, California, connects to almost twenty thousand active members, donors, and visionary philanthropists and hundreds of community chapters while engaging with leading scientists, scholars, and transformational change agents throughout the world. Together we play a vital role in the emerging global consciousness movement.

Thank you for your commitment and vision,

James O'Dea, President
Institute of Noetic Sciences