Dowsing Explained

Dowsing is a type of divination employed in attempts to locate ground water, buried metals or ores, gemstones, oil, claimed radiations (radiesthesia),[1] gravesites,[2] malign "earth vibrations"[3] and many other objects and materials without the use of a scientific apparatus. It is also known as divining (especially in water divining), doodlebugging[4] (particularly in the United States, in searching for petroleum or treasure)[5] or water finding, or water witching (in the United States).

A Y-shaped twig or rod, or two L-shaped ones, called dowsing rods or divining rods are normally used, and the motion of these are said to reveal the location of the target material. The motion of such dowsing devices is generally attributed to random movement, or to the ideomotor phenomenon,[6] [7] [8] a psychological response where a subject makes motions unconsciously.

The scientific evidence shows that dowsing is no more effective than random chance.[9] [10] It is therefore regarded as a pseudoscience.

History

Early divination and religion

Dowsing originated in ancient times, when it was treated as a form of divination. The Catholic Church, however, banned the practice completely.[11]

Reformer Martin Luther perpetuated the Catholic ban, in 1518 listing divining for metals as an act that broke the first commandment (i.e., as occultism).[11] [12]

Old texts about searching for water do not mention using the divining twig, and the first account of this practice was in 1568.[13] [14] Sir William F. Barrett wrote in his 1911 book Psychical Research that:

In 1662, divining with rods was declared to be "superstitious, or rather satanic" by a Jesuit, Gaspar Schott, though he later noted that he was not sure that the devil was always responsible for the movement of the rod.[15] In southern France in the 17th century, it was used to track criminals and heretics. Its abuse led to a decree of the inquisition in 1701, forbidding its employment for purposes of justice.

An epigram by Samuel Sheppard, from Epigrams theological, philosophical, and romantick (1651) runs thus:

Modern dowsing

Dowsing practices used in an attempt to locate metals are still performed much like they were during the 16th century.[16] The 1550 edition of Sebastian Münster's Cosmographia contains a woodcut of a dowser with forked rod in hand walking over a cutaway image of a mining operation. The rod is labeled in Latin and German; " – " ('Rod Divine, Luck-Rod'), but there is no text accompanying the woodcut. By 1556, Georgius Agricola's treatment of mining and smelting of ore, De Re Metallica, included a detailed description of dowsing for metal ore.[17]

In the 16th century, German deep mining technology was in enormous demand all over Europe. German miners were licensed to live and work in England;[18] particularly in the Stannaries (tin mines) of Devon and Cornwall and in Cumbria. In other parts of England, the technique was used in the royal mines for calamine. By 1638 German miners were recorded using the technique in silver mines in Wales.[19]

The Middle Low German name for a forked stick (Y-rod) was [20] [21] ('striking rod').[22] This was translated in the sixteenth century Cornish dialect to [23]

Notes and References

  1. As translated from one preface of the Kassel experiments, "roughly 10,000 active dowsers in Germany alone can generate a conservatively-estimated annual revenue of more than 100 million DM (US$50 million)". GWUP-Psi-Tests 2004: Keine Million Dollar für PSI-Fähigkeiten (in German) and English version .
  2. News: Pellwel. Calvin E. What Is Dowsing? - The Ancient Practice For Treasure Hunting. May 19, 2022. June 19, 2022. March 26, 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230326152055/https://straightforwardguidance.com/what-is-dowsing/. live.
  3. Web site: 2015-08-20 . Bad vibrations: what's the evidence for geopathic stress? . 2022-11-18 . the Guardian . en . 2023-03-26 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230326151937/https://www.theguardian.com/science/head-quarters/2015/aug/20/bad-vibrations-whats-the-evidence-for-geopathic-stress . live .
  4. Web site: Dowsing, Doodlebugging, and Water Witching . Association of Independent Readers and Rootworkers Wiki . 11 October 2011 . 12 October 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20111012224700/http://readersandrootworkers.org/wiki/Category:Dowsing%2C_Doodlebugging%2C_and_Water_Witching . live .
  5. Keystone Folklore Quarterly . Lyman . Thomas G. . Water Dowsing as a Surviving Folk Tradition . 12 . 137 . 1967 . . 2022-06-25 . 2023-03-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230311055757/https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=inu.30000108623236&seq=165 . live .
  6. Zusne, Leonard; Jones, Warren H. (1989). Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. pp. 105–110.
  7. Novella, Steve; Deangelis, Perry. (2002). Dowsing. In Michael Shermer. The Skeptic Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience. ABC-CLIO. pp. 93–94. "Despite widespread belief, careful investigation has demonstrated that the technique of dowsing simply does not work. No researcher has been able to prove under controlled conditions that dowsing has any genuine divining power... A more likely explanation for the movement of a dowser's focus is the ideomotor effect, which entails involuntary and unconscious motor behavior."
  8. Lawson, T. J; Crane, L. L. (2014). Dowsing Rods Designed to Sharpen Critical Thinking and Understanding of Ideomotor Action. Teaching of Psychology 41 (1): 52–56.
  9. Book: Vogt, Evon Z. . Ray Hyman . Ray Hyman . Water Witching U.S.A. . Chicago University Press . Chicago . 1979 . 2nd . 978-0-226-86297-2. via Book: Hines, Terence . Pseudoscience and the Paranormal . Prometheus Books . Amherst, New York . 2003 . Second . 420 . 978-1-57392-979-0.
  10. [Brian Regal|Regal, Brian]
  11. Inglis (1986) pp. 246–247.
  12. Decem praecepta Wittenbergensi populo praedicta, Martin Luther
  13. Web site: Hill . Sharon A. . Sharon A. Hill. Witching for water . Spooky Geology . 19 March 2017 . 2017-04-07 . https://web.archive.org/web/20170320072306/http://spookygeology.com/witching-for-water/ . 2017-03-20.
  14. 15 Credibility Street #13 . Doubtful News . . 2017-03-26 . 2017-04-07.
  15. [Michel Eugène Chevreul]
  16. Web site: Curious myths of the Middle Ages . S. (Sabine) . Baring-Gould . May 26, 1876 . London, Rivingtons . Internet Archive.
  17. William Barrett and Theodore Besterman. The Divining Rod: An Experimental and Psychological Investigation. (1926) Kessinger Publishing, 2004: p. 7
  18. Web site: Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape . 2019-12-26 . 2020-08-02 . https://web.archive.org/web/20200802132748/http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1215 . live .
  19. Book: Gough. John Weidhofft. The Mines of Mendip . 1930 . Oxford University Press. 163035417. 6.
  20. Web site: Wiktionary entry for schlag. 13 January 2018. 28 January 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20180128190531/https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/schlag. live.
  21. Web site: Wiktionary entry for ruthe. 13 January 2018. 29 January 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20180129004249/https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ruthe. live.
  22. Book: Barrett. William. Psychical Research. 1911. Henry Holt & Co. (N.Y.), Williams and Norgate (London) . New York and London. 170. 2 January 2018 . Now, the colloquial German word for the rod was then schlag-ruthe or striking-rod; this, translated into the Middle English became the duschan or striking rod, and finally "deusing or dowsing rod"..
  23. Book: Stratmann . Francis . A Middle-English Dictionary . Oxford University Press . 1891 . 182 . duschen, v., ? = M.L.G. duschen; =dweschen; strike, beat; dusched .

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