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"In an article published in the current issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Scientific Exploration, a science journal with the editorial offices at Stanford University, Professor Hans-Dieter Betz, a physicist at the University of Munich, presents the results of a German government sponsored program to test and apply dowsing methods to locate water sources in arid regions. This ten year project involved over 2000 drillings in Sri Lanka, Zaire, Kenya, Namibia, Yemen and other countries and is thus the most ambitious experiment with water dowsing ever carried out.... " The outcome was striking. An overall success rate of 96% (by dowsers) was achieved in 691 drillings in Sri Lanka. Based on geological experience in that area, a success rate of 30-50% would be expected from conventional techniques alone. ... "Says Betz: I’m a scientist, and those are my best plausible scientific hypotheses at this point. But there are two things that I am certain of after ten years of field research. A combination of dowsing and modern hydrogeophysical techniques can be both more successful and far less expensive than we had thought. And we need to run a lot more tests, because we have established that dowsing works, but have no idea how or why." |
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"A coin was to be hidden in some part of the room... one of the dowsers called in to try and find the coin. ... The odds against two such consecutive successes being due to chance coincidence are 2,025 to 1. (Barrett and Besterman, 1926/1968, p. 258)." "Dowsers were also tested out of doors to determine if they could locate subsurface discontinuities which could not be predicted by even very experienced geologists or botanists.... In nearly all the surveys statistically significant correlations were reported between low soil resistivity and dowsing reactions." "Yves Rocard, professor of physics at the Ecole Normale in Paris, also studied the relation between dowsing and electromagnetic radiation.... He concluded that a dowser could detect a changing artificial magnetic field of the order of 0.3 to 0.5 mO/m... at the level of the subject’s chest if the dowser were walking at a normal speed. Rocard claimed that a good dowser is never wrong when attempting to detect this signal as long as he is not overworked." "Harvalik also found that dowsers could detect and discern different radio frequencies and radioactive substances even with considerable shielding (Harvalik, 1973a; Harvalik and De Boer, 1976)." http://www.tricksterbook.com/ArticlesOnline/Dowsing.htm [This is an excellent website! - bfg] |
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"My uncle Louie considered himself a skilled dowser. I am a Professor of Exploration Geophysics so you might expect me to be skeptical, but I believe my uncle Louie could find water by dowsing." "By the way I picked three neighbors kids and their mom. They all could reliably find the 2" water pipe running along the street right-of-way and the feed lines going into their house. As an electrical engineer I have my own (homebrew and crude) theory why dowsing seems to work so easily. I noticed on my portable AM radio, that running water changes the reception and superimposes some strange sound on the rf signal. The earth's electro-magnetic field definitely is deformed by underground water (or metal) objects. Have not found any scientific treaties that explore this phenomenon in any detail. You know of any? I have also worked for years in the oil well logging field. So I was doubly curious about the dowsing experience. Thanks, Harry Joel" |
| Dowsing for the Dead -- Genealogist searches out of respect for sacrifices of the pioneers - "Tom Corey of McCook "dowses" for graves because of his interest in genealogy and history, and because of his respect for the lives and sacrifices of his ancestors." |
| "U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has hired dowsers, and the Corps’ chief has said with qualifications that he would hire a dowser under some circumstances (Dowsing Can’t Work . . . And Bumblebees, of Course, Can’t Fly, 1968)" |
| "I certainly didn't mean that it is
more "anthropological" to accept dowsing, and, although I've
seen dowsers be successful, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it as a
method to be used in archaeology...."
http://lists.asu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0101&L=histarch&D=0&T=0&P=22643 |
| "In 1933 De Vita placed electroscopes over underground streams, and found that they discharged more rapidly than control electroscopes placed over normal ground of the same soil type and rock type. Jemma confirmed de Vita's results in the following year, and also found that dowsers are affected by the ionisation of the air. This so called fine-weather field is affected by the altitude and position of the sun, and is to do with atmospheric electricity. There are also indications that dowsers are affected by electrical storms." |
| "Barrett and Besterman (1968) carried out field studies for finding water, using a number of independent experiments with two or more dowsers, and compared the results with those suggested by consultant engineers and geologists. They found the dowsers got twice as much water as the engineers, while the geologists got hardly any. They concluded that the movement of the dowsing rods is due to unconscious muscular action, the tension of the grip being converted to sudden neuro-muscular spasms when the operator is in the presence of water." |