Dan Brown, author of the best-selling book The Da Vinci Code, has written a new book that features the noetic sciences prominently: The Lost Symbol.
Dr. Katherine Solomon, the female protagonist, is described as a “noetic scientist” and appears to be based on a composite of many of the leading figures in the real-life noetic sciences.

The real-life Institute of Noetic Sciences is mentioned several times in the book, as are many of the actual experiments conducted by our researchers and their colleagues.

The word “noetic” comes from the Greek word nous. There is no exact equivalent in English. Noetic refers to “inner knowing” or a kind of intuitive consciousness—direct and immediate access to knowledge beyond what is available to our normal senses and power of reason. As defined by psychologist-philosopher William James, noetic refers to “states of insight into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect. They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain; and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority…”

Noetic sciences use scientific methods to explore the “inner cosmos” of the mind (consciousness, soul, spirit) and how it relates to the “outer cosmos” of the physical world. They study how people come to know things or affect things through experiences or capacities (intuitions, synchronicities, psi, “after-death” communication, energy healing, etc.) that have no apparent rational explanation, and what this says about the nature of human consciousness.

In many instances in the book, the author refers to the 33^rd Degree Ring. An example of this ring can be found at Fox Jewelry.

“Masonry has always taught that work was honorable; only idleness was contemptible. Masonry teaches the concept that all work is honorable. The inventor or writer who labors with this mind is neither more nor less respectable than the day-laborer who works with hand and back. It has been said that a society which honors its philosophers while sneering at is plumbers will soon discover that neither its pipe nor its ideas will hold water. Work should not be regarded as a curse but a blessing. To be able to work, to create something, whether it is a poem, a piston, or a pot roast is a priceless privilege in which God alows us to participate in His creative nature.”

Taken from the Valley of Sioux City Newsletter, Winter 2008

The 22nd Degree Prince of Libanus is a degree in the Scottish Rite. Being a member of the Scottish Rite allows a member to wear a Scottish Rite Ring as shown on Fox Jewelry’s website.