If you live in rural setting, you probably are familiar with people who claim to have magical powers to pin point the source of water deep beneath the earth without having to dig a well.
They are called water diviners.
Water divining has been around for ages in almost every country all over the world. There are various ways these diviners ‘detect’ underground source of water. One common and most popular way is by using a ‘dowsing rod’.
A dowsing rod is a ‘Y’ shaped metal rod (sometimes just a branch of wood) which is held by the two arms of the water diviner as shown in the figure.
With the rod held that way, the diviner walks around the area where one is interested in finding the source of water.
When the person reaches the exact spot, the rod suddenly starts swinging up indicating that there is a source of water exactly beneath that spot.
The force with which the rod swings is supposed to indicate the amount of water source, the depth and so on.
This method is so popular that almost everyone believes in this without questioning how it works. They say that ‘some mysterious energy’ that emanates from the water source forces the rod to move! Others credit the special psychic power the diviner has.
What is the truth?
Long long ago, well known scientists like Ray Hyman and others studied this phenomenon by collecting statistics from all over the world. Their conclusion was that in 60% of the cases the predictions of the diviners were correct.
That means more than half the claims. So it should be a sufficient proof of psychic power?
Not really.
The same scientists also showed that in 60% of the cases where no divination was done and the wells were dug, one found water. That means, statistically speaking – if you dig a well randomly at any place, the chances of your finding water is 60% with or without divining!
I have observed that these water diviners generally collect lot of information about the terrain, availability of water in that terrain, state of other wells in the vicinity, and so on before they display their 'psychic power'.
But still, what remains puzzling is - why does the rod move? We will see that at the end.
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Water divining has been around for ages in almost every country all over the world. There are various ways these diviners ‘detect’ underground source of water. One common and most popular way is by using a ‘dowsing rod’.
A dowsing rod is a ‘Y’ shaped metal rod (sometimes just a branch of wood) which is held by the two arms of the water diviner as shown in the figure.
With the rod held that way, the diviner walks around the area where one is interested in finding the source of water.
When the person reaches the exact spot, the rod suddenly starts swinging up indicating that there is a source of water exactly beneath that spot.
The force with which the rod swings is supposed to indicate the amount of water source, the depth and so on.
This method is so popular that almost everyone believes in this without questioning how it works. They say that ‘some mysterious energy’ that emanates from the water source forces the rod to move! Others credit the special psychic power the diviner has.
What is the truth?
Long long ago, well known scientists like Ray Hyman and others studied this phenomenon by collecting statistics from all over the world. Their conclusion was that in 60% of the cases the predictions of the diviners were correct.
That means more than half the claims. So it should be a sufficient proof of psychic power?
Not really.
The same scientists also showed that in 60% of the cases where no divination was done and the wells were dug, one found water. That means, statistically speaking – if you dig a well randomly at any place, the chances of your finding water is 60% with or without divining!
I have observed that these water diviners generally collect lot of information about the terrain, availability of water in that terrain, state of other wells in the vicinity, and so on before they display their 'psychic power'.
But still, what remains puzzling is - why does the rod move? We will see that at the end.
Start Next Previous
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