Is dowsing real?

Hello everyone,

I am quite critical when it comes to science but i understand there is a lot we don't know!

So I came across some ancient knowledge where people in nomadic societies who were trying to find water actually used this ability called dowsing! Its not logical but because there is no science behind the technique doesn't mean its wrong.

Many people still use this technique today. So I tried dowsing for fun and you don't need metal dowsing rods you just allow the energy of the environment to pull your body. Derren brown tried this and it worked for him and also Ed Stafford. I suggest trying to use dowsing to see what it feels like.

I am going to use the dowsing technique more often but I think there is something going on. The theory of dowsing: the energy of the Earth pulls on the body and you are attracted to certain areas. Usually people today use a methodical approach or a systematic approach.

Does anyone have any thoughts on dowsing what do you think is going on?


Love & Light
Peace & blessings

If it works, maybe they are feeling out differences in gravity :huh:
That would assume our brains are really a lot more powerful then we give credit (likely), and our bodies are/can be tuned enough to work at those levels of detection (I've no idea).

Edit; I mean swinging a weighted end from two points means you can use less force at those two points which increases the chance for sensitivity. The weighted end means you can probe out the feeling of gravity better - like a pendulum sort of thing, it might exaggerate the action of gravity to some extent - still with both those things its a long shot IMO but I dont bother ruling it out
:side:

In my region of the US, even people who don't "believe" in it use dowsing to find water and dig wells. It's treated as a special skill and not some supernatural phenomena here. It's...really kind of odd. Kinda like hedgemagic.

much of hedgecraft is still in use because somehow it works....i've been studying it for a couple of years now, even wrote my own book of shadows...it's an interesting hodgepodge of herbalism and other holistic practices that work as well as spiritual practices.

some food for thought, other animals can find water in areas seemingly void of it...perhaps there's an innate sense all living things have that enable them to locate water....

I grew up as a kid watching my grandfather Devine water. He had this funny bathing ritual he would go though before stripping down to his undies and walking arround the bush with his arms up looking for water. I don't ever recall him being wrong but he had a wealth of geological knowledge and always openly used and discussed this to pick areas to start in.

I was a complete skeptic until one day in my early twenties when I was haveing a discussion with my sister. She was telling me that she could not put a swimming pool in her back yard because of a water pipe under her block. Apparently she detected the pipe via Devineing.

I did not believe her so she got out with a couple of bits of wire and walked arround showing me where the pipe was because the wires would move and cross over. I decided to give it a go and I cannot communicate the feeling of shock, horror and utter bewilderment I felt when those wires moved of their own accord in my hands. I was able to trace the water pipe just as my sister had done.

A female friend of mine thought we were both putting it on so decided to have a go too. Nothing, absolutely nothing happened for her right up until I touched her. The wires moved and she screamed. While I kept skin contact with her she could Devine the pipe exactly like my sister and I.

I latter did a plan search with the local council and yes there is a water main going thought right where we detected it.

I really have no idea how this is possible but there must be a scientific explanation. My grandfather use to think it was some kind of magnetic force. I personally think it is some some sort of static electric field. I think this for a couple of reasons. Fist was the shower at our holiday house. Even as a young child that thing would zap me when I went to turn it on or off. It caused many tears as a kid because I simply didn't want to use it. The zap was always far worse if I was the last to shower and the only other person who felt anything was my sister who said that sometimes she felt a slight tingle. Second is the fact that some days my iPhone screen makes my finger all tingerly in exactly the same way.

If I had to guess I'd say it is genetic. It is stronger some days than others.

Anyway I'm weird but really looking forward to hearing other people's experiences.

I'm a natural skeptic until I can see/feel/experience things for myself. Awhile back I got talking to someone who's license plate says "WATERWITCH".

I had to ask. I was curious. I have dowsing rods in the store, I knew what they were but had never gotten any response from them in working with them a bit.

That conversation turned into 45 minutes of instruction on how to use the rods, how to feel energy etc. He was ecstatic that someone was truly interested and even ran back out to his car and got his own personal dowsing rods that he carried in the car with him.

Truthfully I had a ton of fun and was very enlightening. The rods didn't really read for me well. They did for him. However I also have a very heavy metal/magnetic body. I can mess with peoples cell phones, I can drain batteries, I can make people loose signals, I can even mess up the phones location sensors. I went through five droid phones in one month and all them thought I was located in places all over the world including Afghanistan. I'm actually located in Wisconsin. Funny though Apple technology does not have the same problems that the droids do with me. Must be something in the way they are shielded. So for me seeing him use the rods work was really amazing but wasn't a big deal for me to not be able to use them.

Sometimes those old tools are still the best. If a dowser said something I'd be totally inclined to believe them. I do feel it has something to do with energy fields and how the metal in the rod reacts or does not react to it.

Dowsing is real. But there is a bit more science that is involved in it and less so "Force/Cosmic Energy"....From a certain point of view.

Dowsing is meant, created and used to locate water....not so much to follow energy ley line's...it just sort of developed into that. And it has alot to do with faith, perseverance and a willingness not to give up the first try. Even proclaimed experts don't always get an accurate reading right off the bat. It's got alot of self observance involved in the process...the rods are just tools to enhance your own focus/ability to observe the natural flow of the earth we live on.

I of course have my own theories...But Never had any chance to test it out myself.

Some have success....some don't. Much like some succeed at Meditations and others struggle to do it.

Can it detect people? (people being usually at least 50% water)

ren wrote: Can it detect people? (people being usually at least 50% water)

Let's rephrase that to.... Can YOU detect people? The rods are just an extension of you.

Again...I have theories, but no proof or solid evidence on said theories due to lack of proper testing in the field. So at the heart of it...I don't know. I do not think the rods can detect people (or ley lines or water) but they can help you to focus your observation of your natural surroundings and come to sound conclusions based on what you find and interpret in that inner sense you naturally have.

Ariane wrote: I am quite critical when it comes to science but i understand there is a lot we don't know!

...Its not logical but because there is no science behind the technique doesn't mean its wrong.

Talk is easy. Anyone can open their mouths and let words come out. Anyone at anytime in any place for any reason can just start talking on any subject they want.

Talk is cheap.

50 different people can offer 50 different, but equally convincing, explanations for why and how a particular part of the real world works. So if there are all these different people telling me all these different things about how the world works, who am I to know who to believe?

Well you're welcome to believe any random person you want, but personally?, I'm going to believe the person who provides an explanation which most closely matches what we observe in the real world.

That is what the scientific method is for. Talk is cheap, what I really value is evidence. Anyone can provide any explanation, but what I value is whether they can demonstrably prove that their explanation is actually what happens in the real world.

So does Dowsing actually work? Well the only fair way to test this, as with the only fair way of testing if anything has any proof to it, is in controlled experiments.

Sadly there are no controlled experiments which have proven dowsing. Not one person of over 100 dowsers managed to win James Randi's $1,000,000 prize, a competition which has now ceased after years and years of failed attempts to receive it. Dowsers showed they were never any better at finding water than just guessing where the water might be. Most are surprised at this revelation, they sincerely believe it works, but human psychology is a funny old thing and we tend to believe what we want without any critical thought.

There are a number of alternate reasons behind dowsing including, ideomotor effect, confirmation bias, post hoc ergo propter hoc reasoning, but dowsers may unintentionally/unconsciously be influenced by visible signs of water such as the colour and type of vegetation and even temperature.

But perhaps above all the biggest reason one should doubt the claims of dowsers is that if you press for a detailed explanation of how it works they seem unable to provide one. So the human body detects some vague thing which is somehow linked to something underground, but what precisely is being detected, how it is being detected, and what link this has to some object are never fully explained.

Without providing a fully thought out explanation it becomes impossible to test with equipment. What is it about the human body which makes it a better detector than a piece of equipment designed to detect exactly the same thing? Humans are really rather awful at detecting and measuring stuff. You lift something up, how much does it weigh? Are you better at that than scales?

Electromagnetism? We can build detectors to detect electromagnetism, in fact humans can't even detect half the magnetic spectrum, so why would we rely on humans? Gravity? We're even worse at detecting and measuring that, because it is far too weak for us to sense any changes (we've only recently sent up the first satellites to do that).

http://www.skeptics.com.au/resources/articles/australian-skeptics-divining-test/

When the results were tabulated, 111 tries had been made, with an expected 10% success rate by chance alone, There were 15 successes, 13.5%, a figure well within expectation.

But what had the dowsers declared as their expected success rate? It averaged out to better than 92%! Surely a poor performance, and one in which every rule , precaution and Procedure had been carefully and fully approved and agreed to in advance by all [including the dowsers themselves] parties concerned.