ANSWERS: 13
  • As I understand it, a divining rod is used by a dowser or diviner to find something he is looking for, most famously water, but perhaps metal or something else. No reasonable scientific mechanism that fully explains the divining rod phenomenon has been proposed. I am unaware of any controlled tests that have reliably demonstrated that the concept works at all. There is a statistical probability that during any given test, the diviner will "get lucky" and identify something by pure random chance. Anecdotal evidence is typically unreliable. If there are examples of divining rods actually -finding- (not "getting lucky") water or anything else, the only currently available explanation is the supernatural. We have no scientific tools for evaluating supernatural phenomena for the obvious reason that science studies work only in the framework of the natural. I can not discount the possibility that a "spirit" of some sort occasionally guides a diviner, but at this point your interpretation of the effect depends on your beliefs about the supernatural.
  • As previously stated, there isn't any scientific evidence indicating that dowsing or the use of divining rods works in any kind of a useful or predictable fashion. However, there is one particular situation in which a divining rod will actually show some correlation to reality that is more than pure chance. I have experienced such and there was nothing supernatural about it. Many divining rods are either loosely held L-shaped rods held in the hand such that the rods will rotate relatively freely. Another form is a forked stick held under tension such that the tip, pointing away from you, will swing up/down as the "environment changes". When dowsing for water, you basically hold the stick and wander around an area until the sticks change state. The L-shaped sticks might rotate or the forked stick typically points down. The reason why this happens is due to subtle changes in the landscape. In particular, if you wander into a gentle depression, it is very likely that your balance and/or hand position will shift slightly and unconsciously, thus causing the rods or stick to move. Coincidentally, such a depression in the landscape is very often caused by running water either over the surface or underneath the surface. It is enough to persist the belief in the paranormal. However, every scientific study I could find has indicated no better success rate from dowsing than random searches. Anonymous: Apparently, you didn't actually read my answer. To restate: I have tried water dowsing (using a divining rod). I didn't say it doesn't work, just that actual real world scientific studies found that it doesn't work any better than random searches.
  • Well, I know that they work for water or fluids or pipes in some respect by actual experiments personally. But I am trying to find out "why", or what mechanisms/forces cause this. I hypothesize that it is simple and that there are just basic forces involved, probably not a "mysterious spiritual force", but rather some physical law. Here is just one trial which I did, but I ran other experiments as well. I got two metal welding rods about 30" long and bent them into an 'L' shape. Holding the short end of the 'L' in each hand with the arms out-stretched straight ahead with the hands about 25 or 30 inches from each other. The long part of the 'L' is pointing away from the body, while the shorter end is held loosely in the hand. I placed a bucket of water on the ground. Everytime I approached it, the rods would "move their ends" towards each other and cross when one was directly over the bucket. Knowing where some of the water pipes were in the yard, I experimented and had the same phenomenon when I passed over the main. So, then I got a small classroom of kids, blindfolded them and had them walk forward with the rods. Everytime they approached the bucket of water, the rods would "point" toward each other and cross. It was a level concrete surface. I varied positions of the bucket. It worked with every kid and with other adults. History is full of ranting critics who either never bothered to explore by personal observation, or are bent on suppressing good intentions. Galileo had all kinds of ranting, raving critics and he had hell just getting them to look, investigate, and observe for themselves personally through a telescope. The church found him a heretic because "they knew on authority", not by first-hand investigation, that his accounts could not be true. It amazes me that people can be so sardonic without really looking to see by personal experience how this (or some other knowledge) can be. The responses to all this stuff are enlightening in themselves. This is one of the experiments I conducted and I thought I would share it. I know what I observed. Anyone can go to a welder's supply and try for themselves to see if they observe the same type of phenomena. Evidently, there are many others who obtain a similar phenomena with a variety of materials, but I have not found out a good explanation for it. Please help me discover the "why". I tend to think that there are physical universe mechanics involved and I am curious about those mechanics. A friend saw a "surveyer" at an old gas station use rods to locate where the pipes were underground. So, I know that these can work and can work with a variety of different people. Ha! If you send me $20, I'll send you a pair of the smaller version. If they don't work for you, I'll send your money back. But what I am trying to discover is "why" this works.
  • Dowsing (or using a divining rod/rods) works on the principal that every living thing has an energetic field. In humans this is often called an aura and in the earth there are ley-lines (energetic pathways running like blood vessels across the globe). When we think of using divining rods for most people the ancient act of divining for water with hazel twigs comes to mind. Divining rods can be used for divining activities such as locating an underground stream or well, the outside edge of someone’s aura or locating ley-lines. For some the rods will draw outwards into alignment with the stream or field while others may find the rods cross at these points. Some swear that it works and others think it's nothing more than a silly myth. Which view is true? Hard to say since both vehemently suport their respective positions. I personally don't buy it. . .but, I could be wrong. I ran across this little gem from http://www.straightdope.com. The answer is acidic at best, but makes some good points. Dear Cecil: My world view has been severely altered, and I need your help. While on a recent trip to the wilds of Arizona, I had the opportunity to witness--and indeed, participate in--a demonstration of "wishing," which is the location of underground water through a divining rod, or "wish stick." I had always thought this practice was an old wives' tale, but the natives use it routinely to determine where to dig their wells. If a stick of wood is used, it bends toward the ground; if a coat-hanger wire or thin brass rods are used, one is held in each hand, and they cross over each other when water is found. The only explanation the local experts could provide is that moving water creates a magnetic field, but this doesn't account for its effect on wood. I swear on a stack of Straight Dopes that I speak not with forked tongue. Illuminate me, Cecil. --Cooper B., Chicago Cecil replies: Good Lord, dowsing? Next you're going to tell me you got a great deal on a time-share condo. This is about the oldest dodge in the books. You don't describe what your "participation" consisted of, but let me guess: you watched some old geek with a divining rod (typically a forked stick held in a peculiar grip with both hands, but sometimes just an ordinary single stick) wander around the desert for a while with a look of concentration on his face. By and by the stick began to quiver, and suddenly plunged sharply downward, whereupon he exclaimed something to the effect of, "Dig here, you'll find water." Then he said, "You try it, sonny, it'll work for you, too." And gosharoonie, he gave you the stick and showed you how to hold it and lo and behold, when you got to the spot where the stick had plunged down for the old coot, it did the same thing for you--just like some mysto force had grabbed onto it. Naturally, since water in Arizona is typically found 175 to 200 feet below the surface, you didn't actually dig a well to test the accuracy of the rod, but assumed that since it worked for you, it must be legit. Congratulations, sucker. You've fallen victim to the classic Skeptical Young Guppy Becomes True Believer syndrome, described in great detail in a study of dowsing (as wishing is sometimes called) published by two University of Chicago researchers in 1959. "Wishing," incidentally, is a corruption of "witching," as in "water witching," the most common American expression for dowsing, AKA rhabdomancy and divination. Although divining has been around in various forms for millennia, the well-known forked stick method appears to have been devised in the mining districts of Germany (you can supposedly find minerals with a dowsing rod, too) in the late 15th or early 16th century. It was first formally described in an essay in 1556, and since then has been spread around the world by European colonists. In the past 400 years, more than a thousand essays, books, and pamphlets have been published on the subject. Needless to say, dowsing is entirely a fraud, although often an unconscious one. Innumerable experiments, beginning in 1641--that's right, 1641--have demonstrated that: (a) The presence of water has no discernible effect on a rod held above it, whether the rod is made of wood, metal, or anything else. (b) The success rate for diviners is about the same as that for people who use the hit-and-miss method when looking for water. (c) Geologists trained to recognize telltale surface clues (certain kinds of rocks and plants, various topographical features) will invariably far outdo dowsers in predicting where water will be found, and at what depth. Nevertheless, belief in dowsing has persisted, partly because most people secretly want to believe in magic, partly because water is fairly easy to find in most parts of the inhabitable world, and partly because the plunging-stick phenomenon seems so convincing to untutored observers. It's worth noting that in many parts of the eastern U.S. it is virtually impossible to dig a hole and not find water. Granted it's tougher in the west, but I lived in Tucson for a spell and they had gotten well-digging down to such a science that the success rate approached 100 percent. Even over complex hydrological formations, the success rate by the hit-and-miss method is often as high as 75 percent. The plunging-stick phenomenon is caused by a well-documented psychological effect known as "ideomotor action," first described in the 1800s and clinically demonstrated in the 1930s. What happens is that conscious thought gives rise to involuntary, usually imperceptible muscle movements. If I strapped you to a table in a lab and loaded you up with sensors and told you to just think about raising your arm--but not to actually do so--the sensors would probably detect some slight upward motion in that arm, which you'd be completely unconscious of. Ouija boards and several other seance-type tricks make use of this principle. In forked-stick dowsing, the two ends of the stick are held in a rather uncomfortable grip in such a way that the stick is under considerable tension--coiled up like a spring, as it were. Any of four minor muscle movements will result in the stick taking a sudden lurch downward (you can try this in the backyard sometime). An experienced dowser, who has often picked up a fair bit of practical geological knowledge, particularly if he has worked in the same geographical area for many years, often develops a good instinct for judging where water might be just by looking at the terrain. When he walks around doing his number with the stick his mind unconsciously transmits this knowledge to his arm muscles, with predictable results. You, the young sap, don't know anything about geology, but you do know where the stick pointed the first time, and unconsciously you want to duplicate that feat. If either you or the dowser is blindfolded, though, you won't even get close to the spot twice. Besides forked sticks you can use barbed wire, a fork and spoon, coat hangers, welding rods, even a bunch of keys hanging by a chain from a Bible. If you want more information on this ridiculous art, most libraries have lots of books on the subject--right next to the section on tarot cards.
  • I ran across this account at: http://www.drilshop.com/holes/rc.html I was also skeptical of the so called water withces...Until this morning.... I watched with amazement when a city employee pulled up if front of my business to mark waterlines for excavation. He pulled out two l shaped wires about 18 inches long on the long side and about 5 inches on the short side, and began walking through the parking lot. He held the wires up about chest high and out infront of him and very lightly. As he walked the wires would cross, he would stop and spray a bit of paint on the ground. He did this several times until he could see a line and then he marked it as a water line. I was inside laughing hard, because I knew they had machines to detect water pipes. So I went out to ask him why he was using the rods. He said that it was faster and easier than using the machine. He also said that many of the building and water contractors in the area use this method. I asked if I could try it. I tried it and was amazed! It really worked. I claim to have no special powers or anything bizzar, but I saw it work. I went home and fashioned two rods. I talked first with a fellow employee raised on a farm and he said they did it all the time. He also said that if I put the small end of the rods into drinking straws that I wouldn't hold the wires too tight, thus preventing the natural action. At home I used the rods where I knew the water line crossed, and the rods indicated the direction of the line. I walked around my cul-de-sac, in the street and could see the wires cross every time I crossed a waterline stub from the main. I went back to work on a larger road and held the rods and every time the rods began to move I could see where a fire hydrent was stubbed out from the main. I even crossed a road where I knew there was a 12 inch water main and the rods deflected. I don't claim to know how this works, but it did, my son tried it, my coworkers tried it and it worked. I do not know about finding lakes underground streams, fresh, salt water, and the type of geological strata, but this method found water lines. I even set out a gallon bottle of water on the ground where I knew there was no other water, and as I crossed over the water bottle the wires deflected. I could not have squeezed the wires or deflected them in any way and it worked. There must be some science behind this... I have to know that science. There is no logical explaination to me until I can prove it through good science, but it does work. I can undersatnd magnetics and water disrupting the earths magnetics and having an effect on the wires, but I have heard of those who use wood sticks to do this. I will try with that, but have less faith that it works that way. I will be even more suprised if it does. But for finding burried waterlines I believe it. I used the same technique over my underground powerlines with no deflection, but did find that the underground phone lines caused a similar reaction to the water. Maybe it has to do with small voltages creating magnetic fields on the waterlines, as many here use the waterlines as a ground for house electricity. I have been in the field of electronics and computers for over 27 years and cannot explain it other than what I did was real.... RC
  • In following-up other posts here, I found references to map dowsing. Anyone who claims that map dowsing works (using divining rods over a map) is clearly appealing to the spiritual or supernatural. While one could propose that there is an unknown natural force in or around a bucket, pipe or underground stream, there is no possibility of a natural force that causes sticks to move when passed over a map of a piece of land. The only explanation I can imagine for this effect is spirit guidance of some kind. Also, any controlled experiment ought to allow for a mechanical dowser - a stable machine that carries the rods around. If the machine-carried rods do not behave like the human-carried rods, then the effect is coming from the person, not the sticks. This would indicate some kind of extra-sensory perception on the part of the dowser, and once again this puts you out of the realm of hard science and into psychological or spriitual effects.
  • Sometimes they work and sometimes they dont. There are people that swear by them. I have tried them but I wasnt about to dig a hole to find out if there was water or anything else there, I used them when I was ghosthunting while also using a electromagnetic field detector. When they crossed my emf gave a larger than normal reading at the same time which confirmed the crossed rods. The biggest belief is the rods detect a disruption in the earths magnetic field.
  • My grandfather and father used branches with a v shape on one end.They would find water that was closest to the surface so they would not have to dig too deep to find it.It worked well for them,though there is no scientific proof on how it works,but the results were there.I am unaware of how it works but I don't rely on science saying it does not work.
  • Nice forum... I happened across a webpage www.greatdreams.com/dowsing.htm and tried the experiment with human auras/energy fields. I was very skeptical.. alas It works, was even able to move the rods as my energy field expanded (as in the webpage). Further... after I discovered that the rods work, I can concentrate on an object in the other room, walk in that room and the when the rods pick up the objects aura (yes all objects have auras), they pointed right at the object. Being the skeptic I am, I was floored Two thumbs up for divining rods!!
  • I witnessed a water utility worker doing locations for underground water pipes using a thin metal rod about 16 inches long bent at a right angle making one side about 12 inches long. He would hold the shorter end between his index finger and thumb,loosely. Then with the longer end pointing forward, he would walk and then the the long end would align itself with the water pipe. I tried it my self and it worked. He showed me the map of the area with the underground pipe locations. The worker said that water running through a pipe causes a magmetic field.
  • I am a home remodeling contractor in Florida. Two days ago, I was grabbing some lunch and returned to the jobsite to see a man walking at a brisk pace, marking underground utilities. He was using a piece of wire which would whip around and he would spray a little marking paint on the ground where the wire activity moved. Since He was moving so fast, I had to chase after him to see what system he was using to detect the buried water pipes, etc. He said that it was simply a piece of flag-marking wire bent into an "L" and held loosely with his thumb on the back of the wire and forefinger on the front side just below the bend. He said that he had to walk fast or the wire would confuse him by picking up smaller items in the ground (buried trash, etc). I asked him if he placed a charge on the pipe or something to create a magnetic field and he said no. I laughed out loud, thinking that this must be impossible....but keep in mind the guy was actually doing his job like this and getting paid for it!!! I tried it myself later last night in my yard and today on various jobsites and it works fine. To make sure that I was not getting the "Ouigi Board" effect of moving the wire where I intuitively knew utilities to be located, I took my hands out of the mix as much as possible - I found a piece of wood that I could grip and drilled a hole to set the short wire "Handle" into. The idea was to let the wire move relatively freely and allow whatever force acts upon the object to do so. It works!!!
  • Sceptics whose negative arguments are almost always blinded by the brilliance of their own prejudice and ignorance, abound on this subject, as demonstrated by several of the opinions expressed in answer to these simple but controversial questions. Divining rods have been used for many centuries by ancient and modern cultures on all five populated continents, for the practical purposes of locating underground water and mineral ore bodies. In the present day they are commonly used for locating and tracing drains, water pipes, gas pipes, cables and other buried utilities or features. More unusual practical applications such as tracing buried archaeological features, tunnels, limestone caverns, buried treasure, shipwrecks, missing people (particularly bodies), etc, have also been shown to be effective for particular diviners. Even map-dowsing has been shown to be extraordinarily and inexplicably effective in many cases. Just because we do not understand why or how a phenomenon occurs is no reason to deny its existence. This is a subject that has fascinated many people over the centuries and it has often been the subject of contentious debate. There are hundreds of studies into the science and art of dowsing or divining in which the subject is illuminated in varying degrees of clarity, though often these are flawed by incorrect assumptions and hypotheses, and illogical bias against or in favour of the subject. It does, however, bear scientific scrutiny, and it is fallacious of sceptics to say that there is no evidence as to the reality and efficacy of divining as a sensory phenomenon. A most interesting 10-year study by Professor Hans Dieter Betz (a physicist), of Munich University, was published in 1996. This study evaluates thousands of boreholes drilled in metamorphic and igneous terrain where groundwater is typically confined to fractures in the weathered rock zone and deeper faults where the rock is broken and therefore permeable. The study focussed mainly in arid regions of Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Dominican Republic, Congo, Niger, Cape Verde Islands, Kenya, Egypt, and Namibia. Unbroken crystalline rock types are impermeable and boreholes drilled in these regions tend to be barren or low-yielding, relying mainly on small flows from the somewhat fractured zone of weathered rock and porous subsoils. The deeper linear fault structures in the bedrock gather water from all the overlying permeable zones over a large catchment area and provide conduits for rapid groundwater flow. Boreholes that intersect such structures tend to have much higher yields (often more than five-fold greater than the average borehole yield in these regions). The difficulty for geologists and geophysicists is that many of these structures are difficult to detect with sufficient accuracy to present a reliable drilling target. several test bores are usually drilled to get one high-yielding intersection. Consequently a lot of time and money is spent on unproductive drilling and success rates are generally less than 50%. This is where water divining is really valuable, because a skilled diviner can detect and assess these deep water-bearing faults and fracture zones quickly and with great accuracy, making it possible to dispense with test bores and achieve high first-strike success rates. It is well proven by the work of several professional water diviners, including myself, that compared to geological / geophysical methods a competent water diviner can halve the survey time and cost, halve the amount of drilling work required, double the drilling success rate, and double the average yield of completed boreholes. That's at least a six-fold improvement in productivity. The divining techniques are also spectacularly effective in detecting major fault structures in fractured sedimentary aquifers where drilling on the diviner's mark can often yield 10 to 20 times the average yield of boreholes in the same formation. Betz studied the work of Hans Shroter, a GTZ Water Engineer who was an accomplished diviner. The study compared the diviner's and geologists' surveying time and costs, drilling time and costs, and borehole yields produced, relative to the project budgets and the target yield requirements for each water supply. Shroter's individual involvement in the development work consistently achieved 3 to 10-fold improvements in efficiency in terms of cost per capita supplied with water, enabling his water supply projects to provide water for up to five times as many people as those completed without his methods. In many instances he successfully developed substantial water supplies at locations where numerous previous drilling attempts had failed to find any. Using geophysical surveying techniques on selected areas after the diviner had chosen his sites, showed clear narrow anomalies in the geophysics signals corresponding to the chosen points, demonstrating that the diviner's senses respond to certain types of geophysical energies that can be corroborated by scientific means afterwards. In a separate systematic comparison experiment Shroter's methods were pitted against Sri Lanka's best hydrogeological experts, to locate water supplies for several small towns in the Kurunegala district. A minimum target yield 100 litres per minute was set for viable borehole commissioning. The hydrogeologists were given first access to the survey areas and armed with all available geological data and geophysical techniques, after 'several weeks of intensive work' they chose 14 drilling sites. Shroter was then invited to survey the same areas using only his divining techniques, particularly with regard to the minimum yield requirement. Within a few days he had pinpointed 7 locations which he reckoned would supply all the required water. Drilling of all 21 sites proved very significant differences in the results. The hydrogeologists chose 3 of the best sites achieving yields of 400, 400, and 300 litres per minute, but all 11 of their other boreholes failed to reach the 100 l/min minimum yield requirement, with small to useless yields of 80, 60, 45, 25, 22, 17, 10, 7, 6, 1, and 1 l/min. Schroter, on the other hand, obtained yields well in excess of the minimum yield requirement with 6 out of 7 boreholes. The yields were 400, 200, 188, 150, 150, 150, and 30 l/min. In this instance, despite getting 'second pickings' Schroter's target yield matching success rate was 6/7 or 86% as opposed to the 3/14 or 21% achieved by the hydrogeologists. On this basis Schroter was 4 times as effective as the hydrogeologists... Schroter's surveys took less than half the time and a quarter of the manpower, and his total yield approximately matched the hydrogeologists' total yield, but with only half the number of boreholes. On this basis too he was at least 4 times as cost-efficient as the hydrogeologists. I am a professional water diviner with no more than ordinary geological knowledge, and I have consistently achieved similar results to those documented by Betz, with a success rate that is consistently above 85%. I have a reputation for troubleshooting and divining in difficult areas. Many of my boreholes have been successfully drilled within a few metres of dry holes and often in locations that had been drilled many times without success prior to my involvement. This was not accomplished by drilling deeper or larger holes, but simply by accurately locating the best water-bearing structures using my well proven divining methods. Some of these examples are detailed on my website www.geodivining.com and all my surveys and drilling results are well documented. I have also trained non-geologist water diviners to achieve similar success. To return to the original questions... Yes, divining rods do work to some degree for most people, and exceptionally well in the hands of a few really skilled diviners. Unfortunately, however, there is no recognised training or qualification for diviners, and amateurs often make the mistake of trying to run or even fly before they can walk. This has always been a problem that has tended to throw dowsing and divining into ill-repute. Look at this analogy... Take a regular car driver and put him at the controls of a Pitts Special (that's a favourite aerobatics plane), Show him the basics and tell him to go ahead, take off, fly a few loops, and land the plane. If he is brave or foolish enough to try, he will certainly fail, with a high probability of wrecking the plane and killing himself in the process. Now, if this occurred, would we conclude that the flight failed because the aeroplane could not fly? Or would we conclude that the failure was due to the lack of skill, training and experience on the part of the would-be pilot? The answer is blindingly obvious isn't it; because many of us have seen the incredible feats of highly skilled aerobatics pilots, and we know the Pitts Special flies very well, and these pilots can make them do amazing things in the air that most of us wouldn't dream were even possible. If we wanted to learn about aerobatic flying, would we ask the experienced pilot or the novice to teach us? Again the answer is obvious... By the way, everybody knows that a plane will not fly anywhere without a pilot to control it; and we also know and accept that even the best trained and most experienced pilots can occasionally err, sometimes with disastrous consequences. Now put the divining rods in the hands of a beginner who knows little or nothing about the underground environment, and little or nothing about how to apply divining techniques; and tell him to go and find you a supply of 10,000 gallons per hour.... Is he likely to succeed or fail? If he fails, should we conclude that divining rods do not work or are just some form of a magician's trick? Or should we conclude that the failure was due to the lack of skill, training and experience on the part of the would-be diviner? As in the case of the novice pilot, the correct conclusion is obvious. So divining rods work reliably in the hands of a skilled few who really know a lot about how to use them and have a natural talent for doing so... even so, we should also know and accept that even the most skilled and experienced diviners can occasionally err, and will occasionally fail. ... By the way, as with the plane and pilot, it is obvious that divining tools will not function without a skilled diviner to control them. Why then, I ask, do sceptics continually try not only to assume that divining rods should just 'work' for all and sundry, for amateurs as well as experienced diviners; but to expect that they should work perfectly every time? Why is it so difficult for sceptics to accept that using divining rods is every bit as complex, subtle, and demanding an activity as flying a plane. So to the question of How they (divining rods) work.... That is the great fascination... There are so many half-baked theories as to how divining works, many of which have completely the wrong end of the stick (pun intended) or may be too simplistic in their approach to the subject. It is not a simple subject. There are doubtless several bio-sensory, cognitive and subconscious processes involved in practical dowsing or divining. One thing is clear though; that the rods, wires, pendulum, or other dowsing tools do not move on their own. They move by physically exaggerating small and subtle unconscious movements of the diviners' hands in response to a range of sensory stimuli. It is thus the diviners' body and mind that interact with subtle changes in naturally occurring energy fields to glean and interpret relevant information from the unseen underground environment. A diviner is a living geophysical instrument, infinitely more complex and sensitive than any man-made instrument. All geophysicists know that their instruments have to be powered and regularly calibrated and adjusted for variations in the environment and conditions in which they are utilised. Geophysics is not an exact science. It is largely dependent upon the objective detection and subjective interpretation of anomalies in natural or artificially induced electrical or electromagnetic fields, acoustic (seismic) echoes, and small variations in the Earth's gravitational force. No instrument detects any underground structure or object directly or absolutely, most are subject to various kinds of interference, and all interpretation of geophysical anomalies is deductive based on one or more assumptions. Interpretation is often speculative, inaccurate or wholly incorrect. In very few cases can a geophysical interpretation be taken to be 100% reliable. Why then do some people uphold the unrealistic expectation that if divining works at all, it must work perfectly every time? Diviners also, like geophysical instruments, must be powered, recharged, calibrated, and correctly operated, and must also take into account all kinds of interference in order to render an accurate interpretation of what lies hidden underground. By geophysical standards, if we get it right more than 50% of the time, we are doing well; and if we can consistently achieve above 80% accuracy our abilities should be (and are) highly prized. Those who possess the knowledge and wisdom to appreciate the diviners' work are more numerous than any of our sceptics suppose, but their scepticism should be forgiven for sadly there are too many amateurs who dabble in divining and bring it into ill repute. Too many of these amateurs meddle with things they do not understand well and believe all manner of religious or superstitious shibboleths that thwart their efforts and make them the laughing stock of logical minded people. The debate will rage on for many decades to come, I am sure, but one day we shall have a scientific explanation. This will be derived from rigorous scientific research into diviners' techniques and the natural disturbances that we detect. One of my ambitions is to provide an absolute scientific proof that water divining works, and to measure its efficacy for different sensory tasks; locating water sources in excess of a given target yield, assessing approximate yield potential prior to drilling, measuring depths, differentiating rock types and geological structure types, detecting and differentiating metallic ore bodies, oil and gas, etc. There is a great range of pioneering work to do. So? while sceptics bluster, we who know what we are doing with our sensory skills and inquiring minds are quietly getting on with it. Doug Bates Professional Water Diviner UK / Europe / Africa / Australia
  • I'm a skeptic but when the gas and/or water company came to run pipe out next to my home, I was amazed by those wires. I tried my own experiments. Too my astonishment they worked. I found gas and water lines. So there must be something to them???

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