Oh No, Dowsing Again

[Dubious Dick]

Check out the following story, and then let the dolts at Birmingham Mail and Severn Trent Water know what you think (emails below):

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/weird-news/water-divining-finds-club-leak-7512323

I have written explaining that dowsing has zero credible evidence base. That the German study quoted has been comprehensively debunked, and that while a water leak story may be fairly harmless in and of itself, as most here know, harmless beliefs can translate into dangerous ones very easily (ref: the explosives detectors).

Of course they bloody had to quote the British Society of Dowsers. That well known hotbed of rationality and sense, whose president, Gardner, gave evidence for the defence at the trial of Gary Bolton last year. Bolton being the now convicted fraudster who peddled the GT200.

media@severntrent.co.uk

liv.garfield@severntrent.co.uk The Chief Executive

david.brookes@trinitymirror.com Editor, Birmingham Mail

 

[Dubious Dick]

I have received the following response from Severn Trent Water, and have replied to that. I am not expecting anything from the useless Birmingham Mail, but if so will let you know.

Theirs first:

Thanks for your email. Firstly let me explain where this story came from. We were contacted by the Birmingham Mail after the social club contacted them to share their delight when we managed to find and fix an ongoing leak for them. We had been out several times to try and locate the leak and even the most sensitive equipment hadn’t found it. So one of our technicians thought he would try the rods as a last resort. We know that there is no scientific explanation for why the rods appeared to signpost the location of the leak, and it may well be a completely happy coincidence – but the leak was found and fixed. The very fact that we used the rods to finally find the leak is the reason the Birmingham Mail took an interest.

We’d like to reassure you that the use of dowsing rods is not one of our official leak detection techniques and we don’t provide them as equipment for our technicians. We do issue our technicians with incredibly sensitive, hi-tech equipment in order to detect and locate leaks. This equipment ranges from a Correlator, which can detect sound emitted by water passing through leaks in pipes, all the way to gas detection equipment. These are backed up by more traditional methods, such as the use of a listening stick – used to manually listen for the sounds created by leaks. We put a lot of time, effort and money into research and development of better leak detection techniques and technologies, and as you quite rightly point out, there is little or no evidence to support the fact that dowsing rods are effective.

We can’t control what is written in the media, but what we can do is try and steer the story best we can, which is why we provided a quote to the paper.

Hope that helps to answer your query.

My response:

Thank you for your response.

I must refute your assertion that "there is little or no evidence that dowsing rods are effective". In fact there is zero credible evidence. I would point you in the direction of the James Randi Educational Foundation (randi.org) Million Dollar Challenge, available to anyone who is able to pass a properly controlled double blind test. Dowsers make up a high proportion of those who go in for the challenge, and as yet, total failure.

The problem with the Birmingham Mail piece, and the quote Severn Trent provided is that they left the clear impression that dowsing does work. The problem with the Severn Trent quote was that it was unclear and equivocal.

I urge Severn Trent to make it a policy that engineers are not allowed, even unofficially, to carry or use dowsing rods while on duty. If you do allow them to do so then you are tacitly endorsing dowsing, and situations like the one in the story can arise.

As a final point, dowsers claim that they can detect water underground, and this includes in pipes. Hence why the story simply does not add up, because there is no reason why the rods should swing just at the leak, as opposed to all along the pipe.

I trust that Severn Trent wants to support only evidenced based measures, and that your company will take action in order not to be seen to be supporting woo, whether implicitly or explicitly.

 

[Mudcat]

I just read that article. Time to first lie, two sentences:

A leak at a village social club in the Midlands baffled all the hi-tech gadgetry of a giant water company.

But the problem was eventually sorted out by an ancient mystical art which dates back thousands of years.

Most reliable information I could find state that dowsing has only been around since the 15^th century, Germany. It hasn't even been a full thousand years yet.

 

[Dubious Dick]

Good point Mudcat!

I get the impression that the dumb reporter just bought the British Society of Dowsers garbage hook line and sinker.

 

[EHocking]

That's pretty much what journalism has sunk to these days.

Oh and kudos for taking this up with the water company.