Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

What do you think about this?

I pretty much agree with Schott,

"In 1662 dowsing was declared to be "superstitious, or rather satanic" by a Jesuit, Gaspar Schott, though he later noted that he wasn't sure that the devil was always responsible for the movement of the rod."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing

James Randy thinks it's a hoax. I very much believe it works and I have seen it many many times and have personally done it accurately.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

James Randi is still looking to give away a million dollars to anyone who can do it under laboratory conditions. About 70% of those who apply for the challenge are dowsers, whether it be for water, oil, or precious metals. Not one person has done better then random chance.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Yep I know. I can only say I believe it works very well. I have tried to disprove it on several occasions - because I don't want to believe it.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

If I am not misrembering (a George Bush word) I believe I know a UPC preacher who in his pre church days was a dowser.

Two obvious explanations come to mind for that ability;

1. Could be that it is a tool Satan uses to exhibit power even if the person doing it does not realize or want it to be a demonic thing.
3. Could be that this is one of the abilities some people have using some of that vast part of our brain scientists say we do not use for any known purpose. I believe we could have abilities we have not discovered yet or at least some people do. I have an ESP story I was personally involved in I will relate sometime.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I believe its your second explanation, though someone could attribute that to Satan if they wish to.

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I am told large utility companies used this method for locating lines up until the sixties and seventies, and carried the sticks or wires on their trucks.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I say it's B. :D

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I know what y'all are talking about... the guy gets a stick with a good Y in it and says he can find water. I do believe it is possible because I used to do something similar all the time when I worked on a golf course.

When we needed to find where wires were run in the ground or water pipes etc we would take a unfluxed welding rod and bend it at a 90 deg angle toward one end making a downward bend just a few inches bigger than required to grasp it with my hand. (You can use a coat hanger too. It works just as well.)

So what you have now is a small downward pointing section to grasp with your hand and a long section that points forward. Grasp the downward pointing section with your hand tight enough to hold the long section level but not tight enough as to prohibit it's movement left & right. You'll want to hold your arms close to your body so that your hands are just barely in front of you. This is for steadiness and control.

Go to a place where you would like to find a pipe or a wire... or even go to a place where there is a known pipe or wire. Begin at least 6 feet or so back from where you believe the pipe or wire is and slowly walk forward. As you near the pipe or wire you will feel the rods begin to move in your hand. The rod will both begin to come together as you ease forward. When the rods come together at your chest then stop. Your hands are directly above the pipe/wire. It is a good practice to make a mark and then come from the other side and check again. That will give you an exact spot or a small range.

Be warned this also picks up tree roots etc and if it has been raining and the ground is all wet then the results are usually skewed or non existent since water is everywhere.

To me it is clear that these rods are reacting with some sort of field that the wires or water pipes are putting off. Anybody can do it. Just take a couple of metal coat hangers and you're in business. Of course this is finding much shallower things than a water well but I would tend to believe that the concepts are the same.

The dowser is finding a Y shaped branch and they are tensioning the branch to the point that it would easily "tip over" if given a slight nudge from some field that the water might be putting off.

I don't see it as demonic or any such thing. I see it as scientific as the rods clearly work on some similar principle. The first time I used the rods to find a sewer line at my house my kids were amazed. I told them how to do it and I gave them the rods. When they neared the pipe their eyes grew big with amazement as the rods began to come together at their chest.

I don't know what's going on exactly... But I do believe that it is simple science and nothing spiritual.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

This guy cuts 2 rods from one coat hanger. I usually use 2 coat hanger and make one rod from each one. The rods are longer and you begin to feel the movement sooner. Of course, I do not like his terminology of "witching" but he explains it fairly well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBXmq...eature=related

When I worked on the golf course you could buy rods that had handles that were made of pvc with a bearing in the middle that was attached to the rod so you could hold the pvc handle and the bearing allowed the rod to move freely.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Everything in the atomic world has a electrical force field to it. That is what holds matter together. When using something else with a different force field or one which is in positive or negative to the thing your trying to locate, of course then you will have some type of physical response.
It only becomes witchcraft when you try to deceive others into thinking you have some spiritual powers from the dark side.
I ready don't think Jesus intended for us to be stupid.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I just wonder why this has never worked under testable conditions.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

What I do with the L Rods can be demonstrated any day by anyone.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Oh, I believe you and it also seemed to work whenever I tried it as a kid.

But.........

There is a cool million available to anyone who can do it while being watched.

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/...plication.html

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

:toofunny

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Please explain what you find so hilarious....

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Here's the reason...


This doesn't ask someone to prove that they can dowse water... it asks them to prove they are able to do it by psychic, supernatural or paranormal means. Nor is the challenge specifically about dowsing. It's just about anything that people claim to possess supernatural, paranormal, psychic powers.

It isn't a paranormal activity. It's just science.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Then it should work under agreed upon test conditions.

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/encyclopedia.html
The click D and select Dowsing.

From the last part of the description:

At Kassel, north of Frankfurt, Germany, the scientific group Gesellschaft zur wissenschaftlichen Untersuchung von Parawissenschaften (GWUP) in 1992 set up a very efficient and effective site for testing dowsing in cooperation with a local television station. A plastic pipe of suitable size was buried fifty centimeters beneath a level section of field, through which a very large flow of water could be directed from a switching valve. The test area was protected by a large tent, and the position of the buried pipe was prominently marked by a broad red and white stripe. The challenge for the dowsers was not to find the pipe, but only to say whether water was flowing in it or not.

In response to advertisements, GWUP obtained thirty dowsers, mostly from Germany but also from Denmark, Austria, and France. Each dowser was required to perform ten “open” trials in which he or she would know whether or not the water was flowing, and they would have to obtain 100 percent results at that time. This set of trials would provide GWUP with a baseline from which to judge the subsequent twenty “closed” trials which immediately followed, in which they did not know the answer. In all cases, both with the open and closed tests, the “on” or “off” condition was decided by the random selection of a marked ball from a bag.

Each dowser was asked to make, in advance, a statement expressing any objections he might have to the procedure and stating his or her expected success rate. Each and every problem was satisfied and each dowser expected 100 percent success, as attested by the signatures. Then each subject was asked to use his or her dowsing ability to scan the area in which the test was to be performed, to see if any underground distraction was present.

At the end of three days of testing, GWUP announced the results of almost a thousand bits of data to the assembled dowsers. A summary of their results produced just what would be expected according to chance.

Recall that in these tests each dowser had been asked to scan the test area in advance for any anomalies that might distract the powers. It was noted that none of the thirty dowsers found the same anomalies, though all but one found some anomaly, and some found several. Obviously, only one of the dowsers could have been right, and probably all were wrong.

It is perhaps significant that the German word for the dowsing rod is Wünschelrute, which translates as “wishing stick.” Occasionally, the art is referred to in English as “jowsing” or “josing.”

The American Society of Dowsers, Inc., can be reached at Danville, VT 05828. However, inquiries indicating doubt or challenging their convictions will not be answered in a positive fashion.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

The challenge isn't just open to the supernatural either. So called Free Energy inventors also make up a huge amount of the applicants with the machines which are said to run forever and generate more power than they use.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

We used to look for pipes on the golf course with the L Rods and very seldom were the pipes under pressure. You don't dig up a pressured up pipe. You dig up a pressured down pipe.

There could have been water in the bottom of the pipe or whatever field there is that causes the wires to come together could remain in residual form after the water is gone. I never worried that we wouldn't find the pipe if the water had been shut off.

The thing is that we always had L Rods in the back of our truck and we used them on a regular basis to find pipe & wire underground and it never failed us.

I've discovered this... people who doubt... doubt. And not much can fix them. It has worked for me without fail and if I need to find a pipe tomorrow I'd do so within minutes if I have a basic idea where it might be.

I've never sought to find an underground water deposit to dig a well into so I can't speak to that use of the appratus but my experience with pipes & wires gives me a notion that it all works on a similar premise.

But... as was alluded to in the opening post... what we don't understand we call demonic so we can be done with it... or we doubt it without wavering. These people have chosen the latter to deal with what they cannot understand.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

The guy didn't even try to make it look like the wires moved on their own! Watch his hands, man!

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Try it at your house.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I may, but it wouldn't be very conclusive. I already know where the pipes are buried, and unconscious factors could easily (very easily) come into play. I may swing (pun intended! :D) the results either way.

My best hunch about all this is that unconscious factors often play into it, as well as confirmation bias. Same as prophecies and mind-reading and such.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Well there weren't many unconscious factors in play when I found pipes that I didn't know the location of and dug them up after dowsing their location.

There's just nothing that you could do to move yourself beyond your skepticism. That makes one as blind as those who believe blindly.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Funny thing about unconscious factors. You're not conscious of them! :lol

Not true! Indisputable proof will move me (but not of the type mentioned here: http://apostolicfriendsforum.com/sho...73#post1118373).

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

BTW, I'm a bit more open to this than it may seem, from my posts. But that video was hilarious! :lol

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Well you see what you saw... I see what I saw. It clearly works and there is absolutely no need to use your hands to manipulate the rods. No reason at all. But yet... that is what you saw when you watched the video.


You'd have to move your hands to stop it from moving. It's not a case of it might... if you hold your mouth right. It will... and you'd have to hold it hard to stop it.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I guess the rods' movement could have caused the contortions in his arms and hands. ;)

OK, how about if I rig up a mechanical rod holder, allowing them to spin freely? No influence from my hands at all. Should be indisputable.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

im with D4T on this. Ive seen it done by oldtimers locating wells. Ive seen my dad do it looking for burried pipes and even a sewage tank. it works.

and I dont believe it is a spiritaul thing at all. I think there is a rationals scientific explination.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

There is a scientific explanation for this. I don't remember what it is, though.

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Underground minerals, magnetic field, and metals.... I think.

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This one's even funnier!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o64bS-NZA9I

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

That is what a lot of the professionally made ones do. They have a small pvc pipe (maybe 3/4") with a bearing at the top & bottom of the piece of pipe that is welded to the rod so that the rod rotates freely within the pipe via the bearing with no possible resistance or interference from the holder.

There are other ways to rule out grip issues.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

But this one wins. Hands down! :killinme

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrrN6...ture=fvwp&NR=1

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I watched that one and bypassed when picking out a video because... well... you know... there are so many "Timmy's" out there. :)

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

I didn't know that. Now we're talkin'! :)

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I described that setup in the post that had the video that you initially busted out laughing over.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Rods with handles? Seriously?

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Yes. Directly underneath the video.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Uh, yeah, I read that. As if the one holding the handles couldn't influence the direction the rods turn. Mmmmkay.

What I had in mind was something on wheels, and levelers for the rods. They would be free to spin whichever way they "wanted" to.

Re: Dowsing AKA Water Witching
 

Sounds good. Test it any way you want to. It'll pass any way you try it.

But... it requires far less energy to critique than to test.

Let us know when your tests are done.