Water/ gold divining, RU a sceptic, or believer?

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Originally Posted by Tombie

Not at all. It’s the same basis. Belief.
Kids absolutely believe.
So do Diviner’s and Believers of super beings.

I’ve seen evidence on many occasions of this coat hanger voodoo not work. And countless tests performed where it failed.

Not a closed mind, rather an analytical one.

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If your mind was truly analytical, you would see that no conclusion was evident based on your observations, and you would continue to analyse. However, you do not. My comment stands.

Science doesn't claim to offer absolute truths. It uses the available evidence to offer the best explanation based on current knowledge.

Most people who read about the controlled tests that have been done to determine the effectiveness of water divining conclude that there is no evidence that it works.

If you claim that no-one can prove it doesn't work, either you haven't looked at the results of the scientific tests that have been done or you have an unreasonable idea of the level of proof needed.

You standard of proof would also claim that no-one can prove that the sun will rise tomorrow. Most of us think that it is sufficiently likely that we can accept that it will happen.

Why do you not accept the table JDNSW posted as sufficient evidence that it doesn't work?

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Originally Posted by Tins

I'll assume that you all believe that dogs can't smell cancer, or old wives knew nothing about childbirth, right?
No. Dogs can and do smell changes in biological processes, and it is quite credible that they can smell changes from cancer. Certainly they can smell many infections. And "Old wives" knew a significant amount about childbirth - but when science became involved in the late nineteenth century, infant and mother mortality dropped dramatically - "old wives" were not that knowledgeable about infection control, that only became accepted practice after Pasteur's germ theory was accepted.
Science proves everything, right?
No. Science proves nothing. It works by disproving things. You propose a hypothesis and then seek evidence (data) that could support of disprove it either, by designing an experiment to test the hypothesis or simply collecting and looking at data already available. If there is no data that disproves it becomes an accepted theory, and remains the "accepted science" until data is found that is not consistent with the theory but is more consistent with an alternative hypothesis. In this case we have proposed the hypothesis that water divining works. Both experiments designed to test this, and collected data such as the table I posted above disprove this hypothesis. Individual examples of where it appears to work are consistent with collected data showing that even random drilling is likely to find water.
Talk about closed minds. Even the title of this thread is off. Why do I have to be one thing or the other? Nobody can prove to me that divining works, but, equally, nobody can prove, no shadow of a doubt, that it doesn't.
Nothing can be proved beyond a shadow of doubt. But most of us run our lives, either consciously or unconsciously, on the basis of accepting evidence - if we eat when we are hungry, we stop being hungry and so on. All science is is simply a way of dealing with evidence in a consistent and rigorous manner, and accepting the result.
It's like believing in God ffs. Can you PROVE it one way or the other? I'll bet the answer is NO.
This is an old discussion, and the general consensus is that it is not within the domain of science because if god is omnipotent, how can you conceive of any evidence or experiment that could disprove His existence?
Why put down a belief that is contrary to yours?
A belief that reality is not what evidence shows is harmful, as can clearly be seen by looking at the pandemic in the USA and UK compared to here, where governments (and the population) have largely followed the advice of science (i.e. reality) not beliefs.While belief in water divining is not much more harmful than is belief in a flat earth, both encourage distrust of science and is the sort of thinking that leads to results such as we see in those countries.
Wars revolve around thinking like this, and in fact most wars RELY on thinking like this.
Most wars have little to do with beliefs as such, even if these are used as smokescreens, and decisions about war are rarely supported by evidence.
Live and let live, people. The other person is just as likely to be right as you are.
No - some have real evidence on their side. In almost all cases one side is more likely to right than the other.
For the record, I have seen dowsing "work". Can I prove it? No. Does that make me believe in it absolutely? No. Was what I saw fake? Possibly. I don't know, and neither do you.

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Those of us who are taking the sceptic rather than believer choice are those who live on the basis of accepting reality as the evidence shows it, not reality as we believe it is despite the evidence.

The diviners may not even know how it works, but may be subconsciously picking up on things like vegetation, mineral deposits, rock formations on the surface, lay of the land, etc. Like a show I saw years ago about a fireman's "sixth sense" which is not what people think it is, it is actually years of experience, so they get to recognise what a fire should look like, when to expect a backdraft, etc.

Need new glasses. I thought it was Diving. Extraction underwater gold has been done for over a hundred years- Usual by diverting rivers sadly !

A Mexican chap who lived on our farm when I was a kid did "Divining". When challenged a few ounce gold nugget was hidden in a plowed furrow. He failed and it took an hour to find the bloody thing [biggrin][biggrin]

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Originally Posted by Tins

If your mind was truly analytical, you would see that no conclusion was evident based on your observations, and you would continue to analyse. However, you do not. My comment stands.

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And you are more than welcome to hold that opinion.

Having seen unconscious bias on projects where we require sampling and assay data - I’m pretty darn confident that the aforementioned topic is sufficiently ineffective.

I’ve even been on a trip with others from this board wherein Opal miner told us he could use the process to locate Opal. And went on to demonstrate. Yet he’s still looking for that big strike that he is yet to find!

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Originally Posted by NavyDiver

Need new glasses. I thought it was Diving. Extraction underwater gold has been done for over a hundred years- Usual by diverting rivers sadly !

A Mexican chap who lived on our farm when I was a kid did "Divining". When challenged a few ounce gold nugget was hidden in a plowed furrow. He failed and it took an hour to find the bloody thing [biggrin][biggrin]

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I had a similar problem, was using the search engine to try and find a segment on drilling for water I'd seen on the ABC's Landline and was getting stuff about shark attacks!!!
If gold diving worked the wouldn't have had to invent the metal detector.

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Originally Posted by RANDLOVER

I had a similar problem, was using the search engine to try and find a segment on drilling for water I'd seen on the ABC's Landline and was getting stuff about shark attacks!!!
If gold diving worked the wouldn't have had to invent the metal detector.

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I have watched divers successfully using underwater metal detector for gold in a place I am not allowed to say[bigwhistle]

Beach combing is now high tech and underwater is not an problem for bubleheads or free divers which will give you an idea [biggrin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeRdNu3F914

James Randi, spent most of his life debunking stupid stuff , because thats all it is. for example Uri Geller

If you want to open your mind , try reading some of Randi's books, possibly the best being "flim-flam".

Michael Schermer is also a good read..."Why People Believe Weird Things"

these two books will really help some of you poor lost souls.

I think the consensus is on the side of the sceptics. If nothing else, I managed to get an infraction for dodging the swear filter in this post. For posting this extract from the link. Happy days.

Now 84, the retired boilermaker and pastoralist is one of only a handful of water diviners remaining in WA.
But Mr Biggs, who now lives in Mundijong in Perth's outer suburbs, is also a self-described gold diviner.
He readily admits that "99 out of 100" people are sceptics who brush off the bush art as a parlour trick.
"When I tell people I divine for gold, they say 'it doesn't work' or 'it's bull****'," he said.