8 ms·

My grandfather was a "well witcher" (Appalachian roots here). Many believe that's woo woo or some kind of super power. The man was incredibly intelligent and re

My grandfather was a "well witcher" (Appalachian roots here). Many believe that's woo woo or some kind of super power. The man was incredibly intelligent and resourceful and he had a reputation for finding water every single time he dropped the drill into the ground. When I was a kid I used to go to sleep listening to stories of my dad and his dad driving around on a 2 ton truck with a 3 ton drill and how the brakes always went out. Somehow they always lived to tell the tale. Haven't thought about this in a long time. Good memories.

benoliver999 3y ago
In The Traveller's Tree by Patrick Leigh Fermor, a travelogue from the Caribbean, he gives an account of water divination. He initially sees it as some voodoo myth, and is taken aback when they repeatedly find water.
- digitalsushi 3y ago
  Ok, if I point at a random spot in the ground in an area that generally has water, and I said, "dig here and you will find water", and you put 1/5 a mile of pipe down into the earth and water comes up, am I some type of miracle? Would those people work in the desert? I think it's a lotto ticket that always wins.
  - finnh 3y ago
    I think there is a more functional and charitable read of this: not all of our senses are plumbed all the way through to our conscious mind at all times. small little hints (like minor changes in smell, relative humidity, maybe just pattern-matching on the lay of the land) are down in the noise, and pulling out your trusty sticks gives your subconscious a way to send a signal to your awareness. Kinda like acupuncture - does my pulse really have seven levels that mean different things? I doubt it.. but a successful acupuncturist might still be able to diagnose "what hurts" using said technique, when really they've already picked up on other clues from your gait, posture, etc. "subliminal" and "subconscious" are over-used and vague words, but we've all had the experience of wearing a new clothing item and receiving an uncommon number of compliments, including from strangers who wouldn't know it's new. I've always assumed we are unconsciously presenting the new thing with a bit of flair, and that equally-unconsciously draws the eye.
    - darkerside 3y ago
      Eye tracking probably plays a big role. We are hardwired to notice what other people are looking at. Also, you bought it because it looked good, didn't you?
      - finnh 3y ago
        The eye tracking explanation is a good one, thanks. I think it supports my hypothesis by providing a possible mechanism of action. To your second point: yes, of course. But three weeks later it looks (mostly) the same but stops drawing compliments.
    - stickfigure 3y ago
      This is far too charitable. The first question we should ask is "does it actually work?" and the answer is NO. The wikipedia page lists quite a few scientific studies that establish this. The net summary is: The scientific evidence shows that dowsing is no more effective than random chance. It is therefore regarded as a pseudoscience. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing
      - the_fury 3y ago
        You have to be careful of what you mean by "does it actually work". Does the dowsing find water hidden in a random spot or is the dowser tapping into subconscious knowledge about the land to find it. The parent is talking about the latter. Look up "Ideomotor phenomenon" in your source. It's right above the pseudoscience bit.
        eesmith 3y ago
        It's not like subconscious knowledge must be valid subconscious knowledge. The ideomotor phenomenon is an expression of internal belief, which may be little different than a wild-ass guess. There's no evidence that the dowser is tapping into subconscious knowledge in a way that gives results any better than - or different from - chance.
  - benoliver999 3y ago
    "These people" are generally called upon when the community is struggling to find water.
  - monkmartinez 3y ago
    These people do work in the desert. I have a buddy that drills wells here in Arizona and he WILL NOT put a drill into the ground without a Witcher. I have a really hard time with "witching" from a logical POV, but my buddy and his $130k truck/equipment swear by it. I call that putting your money where your mouth is.
    - gregmac 3y ago
      The test would be finding a spot where a witcher says there isn't water, and then drilling there. There's water almost everywhere in the ground -- the questions are is there enough of it to meet the need? is it usable (ie: not contaminated with salt or toxic chemicals)?
      - gallamine 3y ago
        > There's water almost everywhere in the ground In Arizona?
        soperj 3y ago
        Yes.
        kip_ 3y ago
        https://new.azwater.gov/aaws/maps-resources https://new.azwater.gov/aaws/maps-resources will give you a good idea of how far down wells have to go in various areas of Arizona.
        kip_ 3y ago
        Particularly https://azwatermaps.azwater.gov/gwsiweb/ https://azwatermaps.azwater.gov/gwsiweb/
    - soperj 3y ago
      > I call that putting your money where your mouth is. Others would say "A fool and his money are soon parted".
- naikrovek 3y ago
  the depth of the water table is fairly well known throughout the world, and it is not like a series of underwater rivers which are easily missed; the water table is called a "table" because it is very large and very flat. if you are within 100 miles of a natural body of water, or in a flood plain, or anywhere that it rains semi-regularly, drilling will get you to a source of water. there's no magic or divination involved.
presidentender 3y ago
My dad drilled water wells in the US after spending many years working on oil wells overseas. His clients would often hire witchers (water witches, water witchers, well witches - I think the distance from Appalachia to Montana clouded the specific vocabulary). You'd have this very old man dodder around the property with a pair of sticks, and when the sticks magically chose to pull together and cross, that's where you'd dig the well. I do not recall whether the magical approach was any more successful than the traditional approach.
- stickfigure 3y ago
  It's shocking how many people still give weight to astrology.
  - deleted 3y ago
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  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - cman1444 3y ago
    I consider myself a pretty cynical person, but I tried it myself to prove someone else wrong and I couldn't help but feel like it actually worked. We were looking for a water pipe, not just sitting groundwater. The only explanation I could come up with was that for some reason a magnetic field was being created by the pipe underground. I don't remember if the water was flowing or not when we did it. I feel silly even commenting this, but we truly did find the pipe exactly where I was standing when the rods pointed together. Of course it's very possible that I unconsciously tilted my hands in the spot where I suspected the pipe would be. Even though I did make a conscious effort to not do exactly that, I wonder if there is some psychological factor in the phenomenon.
    - stickfigure 3y ago
      It's possible you just got lucky. That's the problem with N=1 experiments, and why you should be skeptical of your limited experience. Feynman put it this way: The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.
candiddevmike 3y ago
If you dig deep enough anywhere you'll probably find water eventually.
MisterBastahrd 3y ago
.... Your grandfather knew that he needed to find soil that wasn't covered in a stone slab and how deep he needed to dig to hit the water table. That's not woo woo or some kind of super power. That's simply having the experience of having dug a deep hole in the ground a few times.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
0x445442 3y ago
When I was younger I witnessed a well witcher find a location with a devining stick. Spooky stuff.
- lost_tourist 3y ago
  Or as I suspect like where I grew up, if you dig down far enough you will hit water. The professional guys there would just ask "where do you want it?" and 99% of the time there was water there and not that far down.

benoliver999 3y ago

In The Traveller's Tree by Patrick Leigh Fermor, a travelogue from the Caribbean, he gives an account of water divination. He initially sees it as some voodoo myth, and is taken aback when they repeatedly find water.

digitalsushi 3y ago
Ok, if I point at a random spot in the ground in an area that generally has water, and I said, "dig here and you will find water", and you put 1/5 a mile of pipe down into the earth and water comes up, am I some type of miracle? Would those people work in the desert? I think it's a lotto ticket that always wins.
- finnh 3y ago
  I think there is a more functional and charitable read of this: not all of our senses are plumbed all the way through to our conscious mind at all times. small little hints (like minor changes in smell, relative humidity, maybe just pattern-matching on the lay of the land) are down in the noise, and pulling out your trusty sticks gives your subconscious a way to send a signal to your awareness. Kinda like acupuncture - does my pulse really have seven levels that mean different things? I doubt it.. but a successful acupuncturist might still be able to diagnose "what hurts" using said technique, when really they've already picked up on other clues from your gait, posture, etc. "subliminal" and "subconscious" are over-used and vague words, but we've all had the experience of wearing a new clothing item and receiving an uncommon number of compliments, including from strangers who wouldn't know it's new. I've always assumed we are unconsciously presenting the new thing with a bit of flair, and that equally-unconsciously draws the eye.
  - darkerside 3y ago
    Eye tracking probably plays a big role. We are hardwired to notice what other people are looking at. Also, you bought it because it looked good, didn't you?
    - finnh 3y ago
      The eye tracking explanation is a good one, thanks. I think it supports my hypothesis by providing a possible mechanism of action. To your second point: yes, of course. But three weeks later it looks (mostly) the same but stops drawing compliments.
  - stickfigure 3y ago
    This is far too charitable. The first question we should ask is "does it actually work?" and the answer is NO. The wikipedia page lists quite a few scientific studies that establish this. The net summary is: The scientific evidence shows that dowsing is no more effective than random chance. It is therefore regarded as a pseudoscience. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing
    - the_fury 3y ago
      You have to be careful of what you mean by "does it actually work". Does the dowsing find water hidden in a random spot or is the dowser tapping into subconscious knowledge about the land to find it. The parent is talking about the latter. Look up "Ideomotor phenomenon" in your source. It's right above the pseudoscience bit.
      - eesmith 3y ago
        It's not like subconscious knowledge must be valid subconscious knowledge. The ideomotor phenomenon is an expression of internal belief, which may be little different than a wild-ass guess. There's no evidence that the dowser is tapping into subconscious knowledge in a way that gives results any better than - or different from - chance.
- benoliver999 3y ago
  "These people" are generally called upon when the community is struggling to find water.
- monkmartinez 3y ago
  These people do work in the desert. I have a buddy that drills wells here in Arizona and he WILL NOT put a drill into the ground without a Witcher. I have a really hard time with "witching" from a logical POV, but my buddy and his $130k truck/equipment swear by it. I call that putting your money where your mouth is.
  - gregmac 3y ago
    The test would be finding a spot where a witcher says there isn't water, and then drilling there. There's water almost everywhere in the ground -- the questions are is there enough of it to meet the need? is it usable (ie: not contaminated with salt or toxic chemicals)?
    - gallamine 3y ago
      > There's water almost everywhere in the ground In Arizona?
      - soperj 3y ago
        Yes.
      - kip_ 3y ago
        https://new.azwater.gov/aaws/maps-resources https://new.azwater.gov/aaws/maps-resources will give you a good idea of how far down wells have to go in various areas of Arizona.
      - kip_ 3y ago
        Particularly https://azwatermaps.azwater.gov/gwsiweb/ https://azwatermaps.azwater.gov/gwsiweb/
  - soperj 3y ago
    > I call that putting your money where your mouth is. Others would say "A fool and his money are soon parted".
naikrovek 3y ago
the depth of the water table is fairly well known throughout the world, and it is not like a series of underwater rivers which are easily missed; the water table is called a "table" because it is very large and very flat. if you are within 100 miles of a natural body of water, or in a flood plain, or anywhere that it rains semi-regularly, drilling will get you to a source of water. there's no magic or divination involved.

presidentender 3y ago

My dad drilled water wells in the US after spending many years working on oil wells overseas. His clients would often hire witchers (water witches, water witchers, well witches - I think the distance from Appalachia to Montana clouded the specific vocabulary). You'd have this very old man dodder around the property with a pair of sticks, and when the sticks magically chose to pull together and cross, that's where you'd dig the well. I do not recall whether the magical approach was any more successful than the traditional approach.

stickfigure 3y ago
It's shocking how many people still give weight to astrology.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- cman1444 3y ago
  I consider myself a pretty cynical person, but I tried it myself to prove someone else wrong and I couldn't help but feel like it actually worked. We were looking for a water pipe, not just sitting groundwater. The only explanation I could come up with was that for some reason a magnetic field was being created by the pipe underground. I don't remember if the water was flowing or not when we did it. I feel silly even commenting this, but we truly did find the pipe exactly where I was standing when the rods pointed together. Of course it's very possible that I unconsciously tilted my hands in the spot where I suspected the pipe would be. Even though I did make a conscious effort to not do exactly that, I wonder if there is some psychological factor in the phenomenon.
  - stickfigure 3y ago
    It's possible you just got lucky. That's the problem with N=1 experiments, and why you should be skeptical of your limited experience. Feynman put it this way: The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.

candiddevmike 3y ago

If you dig deep enough anywhere you'll probably find water eventually.

MisterBastahrd 3y ago

.... Your grandfather knew that he needed to find soil that wasn't covered in a stone slab and how deep he needed to dig to hit the water table. That's not woo woo or some kind of super power. That's simply having the experience of having dug a deep hole in the ground a few times.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

0x445442 3y ago

When I was younger I witnessed a well witcher find a location with a devining stick. Spooky stuff.

lost_tourist 3y ago
Or as I suspect like where I grew up, if you dig down far enough you will hit water. The professional guys there would just ask "where do you want it?" and 99% of the time there was water there and not that far down.