Dowsing: Fact or Fiction?

scouter27 said:
You are missing something. It's not about water at all. It's about the dowser's ability to "feel" something. The ideomotor effect mentioned in the article is exactly correct. Whether it's sticks, rods or crystals, the dowser is responsible for the movement. It's the innate ability of that person that determines the effectiveness. I have seen it work for finding a great variety of items, and have no doubt that in the right hands it is an effective tool. But it's all about the effectiveness of the dowser.

This is a highly metaphysical subject, and I could go on for a long time, but I won't, because it seems as though you made up your mind prior to even asking.
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I believe in facts and science, not mystic bullcrap. Sorry fellas, this is junk.
 
I do not believe that the copper wire method to locate underground lines is metaphysical at all. Like I said, I have never taught anyone who could not quickly do it. I believe that there is a totally scientific explanation.

Now, dowsing with a willow fork to find water I am very skeptical about, although I have seen it done, albeit in an area where it would be more difficult to find a location where you would not find water if you dug a well.
 
Aaah. This is interesting. I've seen such claims before and have responded to them as part of my previous government job. Also had some apparently related claims involving finding certain elements via dowsing.

So far as I know, no one has provided any credible scientific basis for these claims. I have seen some attempts to credit the detection of magnetic fields or magnetic fluxes, but the mathematics never seemed to work out properly. I have also seen attempts to explain dowsing via quantum-level fluctuations of local fields (of various sorts), but those attempts also broke down in the details.

This does not mean that I would feel comfortable discrediting folks who have used dowsing techniques over the years. Rather, there is no scientific consensus that these methods work, let alone HOW they work. I suspect something may well be happening -- and that something may not have anything to do with the dowsing rods themselves (certainly, no theories based on responses within the rods themselves have ever come close to working out).
Consider instead that many birds navigate by means of the earth's magnetic field. The details of their methods currently escape us, but enough evidence has been gathered over many decades ... plus careful measurements of the brains of various avians ... to lead scientists to conclude that the brains of migrating birds can respond to the amplitude and direction of the earth's magnetic field. One day, I'm sure we'll know much more about the details of bird's methods and how those methods connect to a bird's anatomy. This is mere supposition on my part, but perhaps the brains of certain humans are also sensitive to local variations in magnetic fields. This sensitivity may be very minute and might well need training, ritual, even belief to make it useful. I would conjecture that we connect the ritual of "dowsing" to this sensitivity, and thus certain people might be able to detect underground power lines or perhaps even moving sources of water in this way.

Please be aware that this is merely conjecture on my part, unconnected to a proper theory with appropriate mathematics and a detailed physical mechanism. It is pure speculation ... and speculation can be fun.:)

Of course, YMMV.
 
I know it works. I've done it for a long time in my work for an underground utility locating contractor, and I get skeptics nearly every time someone new sees me do it. Until they dig a hole and find the gas line right where I said it would be. I've done it with copper rods, brass rods, steel rods (the little stems from the utility flags)... Even saw one person who had a manufactured dowsing rod that was a handle with a telescoping steel rod attached by bearings to rotate easily.

I don't know exactly how it works, although I would guess it has to do with the earth's polarity. I could surely be wrong, though.

It's not a magical property of the dowsing rod. That much I know.
 
I can't speak to using it to find electrical lines or metal pipes, but using it to find water has been pretty thoroughly debunked. There was a study in Munich that claimed 6 out of the 500 candidates it tested showed greater than chance ability to locate water, but the anaylysis of the data was further examined and found to be underwhelming. A more recent study in Kassel, Germany involved plastic pipes buried underground through which they could control the flow of water. Of the 30 'expert dousers tested none showed a result that was statistically better than chance searching. I don't doubt that the success rate is much superior when away from similar controlled environments, probably due to the individual dousers familiarity with the environment and use of pattern recognition and clues as to where water lies, but as an ability to find water with no other indicators it seems like a false method.
 
Skrapmetal:

I once had a line crew assigned a pole-replacement job in a residential section of Selma, Alabama. I drove up to the site and the foreman told me he had just called the local phone company to come stake the dig site. I retrieved my copper rods and placed an X on the ground where the wire and I thought it would be safe to dig. The phone company tecnnician arrived with a pipe horn, hooked his transmitter up and staked a dig spot about a yard from my X, with his stake right over what I thought was the location of the cable. I tried to convince him otherwise, but he made the statement, "I guarantee if you dig right here you will miss the cable." His recommendation trumped mine, since it was his cable, so our crew set up to auger on the staked location.

I drove away and made it about three blocks before the foreman radioed me that he had a lot of phone cable coming out of the hole. I'll bet that you have had similar experiences.
I have used both, and will trust the copper wire over an electronic pipe horn any time.
 
Okay. Everyone stop for just a minute. All of you who are claiming that it really works and that you do it all the time, etc... you do realize that someone is still offereing 1 million dollars ($1,000,000) if you can prove it works? You don't even have to explain it scientifically; you just have to prove that it works reliably.

No one has EVER passed the challenge, and I'll bet all 4 limbs that you won't either.

Here it is: http://www.randi.org/library/dowsing/
 
"I believe in facts and science, not mystic bullcrap. Sorry fellas, this is junk."

You need to hang your hat somewhere and basing your beliefs on the scientific method and conclusions reached using it gives you a solid foundation on which to stand.
However realize that 6 centuries ago you would have the belief that the world was flat. Before that the earth was the center of the universe.
 
Bo T said:
"I believe in facts and science, not mystic bullcrap. Sorry fellas, this is junk."

You need to hang your hat somewhere and basing your beliefs on the scientific method and conclusions reached using it gives you a solid foundation on which to stand.
However realize that 6 centuries ago you would have the belief that the world was flat. Before that the earth was the center of the universe.
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It was the mystic-type thinking that pushed the world-is-flat idea, not the scientific method as we understand it today. This does not mean I put to much faith in science. For instance I don't think we are sophisticated enough yet to make good climate models. Having said that, dowsing is one of the Art Bell things no one has been able to prove in a controlled environment, kinda like "remote viewing".
 
Codger_64 said:
So.... I take it that you tried it and failed? I've tried it and succeded.
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Yeah, and i tried remote viewing and know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. And I took my dog for a walk where a well dug anywhere will produce water. I let the dog take a dump, drilled there, and viola! ...water.
 
bladerique said:
I believe in facts and science, not mystic bullcrap. Sorry fellas, this is junk.
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yoda-luke-small.jpg


Luke: I don't, I don't believe it.
Yoda: That is why you fail.

Sometimes you just have to believe. There are things that seem impossible, yet those who believe do them all the time. Breaking a stack of boards or bricks with your hand for example - if you had never seen it or heard of it before you would say "no way, its scientifically impossible for the human body to do that". Yet, if you believe you can, with a bit of instruction its completely possible. Anybody can do it if they believe they can.
I saw a crew of 10 guys search for a water gate for hours in three feet of water (36" water main rupture) in sub freezing temperatures using maps and survey points with no luck. Finally the old guy with the sticks showed up and found it in about 20 minutes.
Shakespeare wrote
"Our doubts are traitors,
And make us lose the good we oft might win
By fearing to attempt"
If someone hadn't believed enough to send that guy out, the damage from that break would nave been far worse.
 
Well, I have never tried it, BUT I have a friend from south central KY that is very intelligent, self-taught, fiercely independent, a bit of a hard-case with a big extended family. Time came when family had aquired property and were building a house for Granny et al on top of a ridge. Water service was a problem and the talk turned to dowsing. My friend, who was 12 YO at the time suddenly became "convicted" of the idea and said let me try it. The other scoffed and jeered, but Granny said no, let the boy try. He did the willow branch routine and fixed on a location soon. He told me that it had nothing to do with him but the wand would turn despite any effort he made to hold it. They did get a driller in and did drill a deep well that hit an everlasting spring feed. He said that you could put you ear to the bore and that the rushing of the water sounded like a washing machine churning. There is an emotional, intuitive dimension to all this. When You know , you know.
 
bladerique said:
Yeah, and i tried remote viewing and know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. And I took my dog for a walk where a well dug anywhere will produce water. I let the dog take a dump, drilled there, and viola! ...water.
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Obviously you are not asking the question "Dowsing: Fact or Fiction?" you are telling us Dowsing is for the weak minded! I tried it today for the first time, and it works for me eyes closed and thumbs off the wires... I don't believe it is supernatural, hokus pokus, but something is happening. Don't be a hater.
 
Arathol said:
Sometimes you just have to believe. There are things that seem impossible, yet those who believe do them all the time. Breaking a stack of boards or bricks with your hand for example - if you had never seen it or heard of it before you would say "no way, its scientifically impossible for the human body to do that". Yet, if you believe you can, with a bit of instruction its completely possible. Anybody can do it if they believe they can.
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Brick/board breaking has zero to do with belief and everything to do with physics. Go to a demonstration where they perform breaks on multiple bricks, then ask them to remove the spacers and try the trick again. If they're smart they won't do it, if they believe they can they'll most likely end up with a broken hand and a pile of unbroken bricks. It's true that there are many areas where scientific understanding of physical and natural phenomena is incomplete, but belief just doesn't factor into the end result.

Almost forgot, there is a remote possibility that belief could play a role in quantum mechanics, as observation and perception seem to have a measurable effect on some quantum particles. I find it unlikely, but acknowledge that it is possible.
 
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There are many places in the USA where the aquifers are right below us so we can drill a well almost anywhere. Once again, this has not been reproduced in a controlled environment.
 
RyanW said:
Obviously you are not asking the question "Dowsing: Fact or Fiction?" you are telling us Dowsing is for the weak minded! I tried it today for the first time, and it works for me eyes closed and thumbs off the wires... I don't believe it is supernatural, hokus pokus, but something is happening. Don't be a hater.
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Well there ya go then. I don't make it up. And I don't look for gold or deep aquifers. I look for things which carry current near the top of the ground. Buried electrical lines, gas lines, phone, septic and water lines. As I said, it will also que on burried metal like a car axle or farm impliments and water bearing tree roots. I don't have to concentrate on any particular thought, only holding the rods loosely enough that I don't influence their motion.
 
Codger_64 said:
Well there ya go then. I don't make it up. And I don't look for gold or deep aquifers. I look for things which carry current near the top of the ground. Buried electrical lines, gas lines, phone, septic and water lines. As I said, it will also que on burried metal like a car axle or farm impliments and water bearing tree roots. I don't have to concentrate on any particular thought, only holding the rods loosely enough that I don't influence their motion.
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Go win a million dollars then. I dare you.
 
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