Dowsing: an incredible facet of the human mind

Dowsing is a method of finding water and minerals that has been in use for several millennia. Dowsers used the method without trying to explain its essence, practically, recognizing it as an esoteric method.

This method is a kind of bio-location - the capturing of a reflected, or direct signal from the object. In the animal world, bats and dolphins and some fish use bio-location.

Dowsing is considered a kind of radiesthesia - a method based on the conscious natural ability of a person to perceive (locate) weak information signals of the external environment.

For a long time, we have been aware of the ability of some people to find groundwater, oil, gas, and minerals with a forked stick (indicator). This search method is used in many countries.

One of the ancient frescoes in the cave of Namibia depicts a Neolithic man with a forked stick in his hands. The first researchers of this monument of primitive art found that the plot relates to some kind of cult of one of the African tribes.

This would probably have satisfied historians if the same plot wasn’t repeated on ancient Chinese miniatures and medieval European engravings. In Norway, there is even a monument to a dowser who discovered several mineral deposits.

So how does the dowsing method work? Most theories allow the existence of radiation of the Earth's interior. Practicing dowsers consider their abilities as determined by the direct connection between the thinking process and the desired object. The fact that many dowsers often do their search without any tools at all, speaks of the perception of some kind of radiation by the brain or a part of it.

V.С. Reddish, professor at the University of Edinburgh stood in the old ways. In his book, D-Force: A Remarkable Phenomenon, published in 1993, he tried to substantiate the existence of a special force that influences the work of a dowser, but which is "no more strange than gravity and electromagnetism and therefore does not require going beyond the limits of current physical knowledge. As a physicist, he seems to approach the problem with the notion that the mystery of dowsing must be answerable by a physics explanation.

The German researchers went further with dowsing research. The encouraging results of their study were published in the Journal of Scientific Exploration

The study was conducted with the expectation of finding consistent and economical ways of discovering drinking water in Third World countries.

During the course of this study, researchers evaluated the successes and fiascos of dowsers, who were trying to trace water at thousands of sites in Kenya, Sri Lanka, Zaire, and some other regions over a ten-year period. Geological experts organized a scientific study group to assess the outcomes. Drill teams guided by dowsers showed an impressive success rate, more than 95 percent in some areas.

H.Betz, a physicist at the University of Munich, who headed the research group, stated that a combination of dowsing and modern techniques can become more effective, and far less costly than we had thought.

Most traditional scientists are still skeptical about dowsing. However, facts are a stubborn thing, and sooner or later, traditional science will have to more thoroughly investigate the physical nature of this amazing phenomenon.

At a certain stage of its development, in the conditions of increasingly complex methods of processing and interpretation in modern geophysics, life insistently demanded a transition from the further quantitative accumulation of the amount of knowledge in this science to some of its qualitative changes. As a result, methods began to appear that are extremely effective in solving a number of geophysical tasks, while being completely unique in their simplicity, with dowsing being one of them.

“Every observation that we make, every mission that we send to various places in the solar system is just taking us one step further to finding that truly habitable environment, a water-rich environment.” - Heidi Hammel