I’m not certain, and perhaps someone else may be able to point to this, but I think that there has been research on the ideomotor effect and video examination, showing very small movements of the muscles/limbs involved.

One aspect of dowsing that contributes to the effectiveness of minute muscle movements is the fact that the dowsing tools are in a state of tension and imbalance. So, even a tiny movement can cause significant changes in the position of the rod(s). That is what I have understood about the subject, anyway.

Thanks. “ideomotor” was the word, not microtremors. But what about studying why it seems to work? Has the possibility of subconsciously twisting the wires or limb at a certain point been examined?

See, there’s a party trick based on that. Ask someone to hide an object while you’re stepped out of the room. Pick someone from the group and hold their hand. Give them whatever spiel you like, but make sure you tell them that they’re going to point out out the object. Take their hand and lead them around the room. Usually they’ll try to point *away* from the object. Which, of course, leads you right to it.

Behold the power of suggestion.

How did you get doing that Phil ?

And congrats on the Asteroid name sake.

In regards to dowsing, look up the “ideomotor effect.” James Randi mentions it a lot in his articles, and a number of other researchers have observed the same phenomenon.

The other fun part is that you – and they – never know for sure what they’re going to find out. That increases viewer interest. If they only showed the “Busted” myths, then it only takes long enough to see the episode’s topics before the average TV viewer will flip the channel. And “Mythbusters” conveys a sense of “being there” in that you see how they set up the tests and the mistakes along with the successes.

Personally, I’d like to see a show take a step beyond proving and disproving, and try to figure out what’s going on. Like dousing. The Amazing Randi has done an excellent job in showing that it doesn’t actually detect underground objects, but I don’t think he ever investigated exactly why it seems to work. Does the mind subconsciously cause microtremors in the hands to make the stick or wires swing over a spot? Say, a person sees a water main out of one corner of his eye, a house in the other, and subconsciously “connects the dots.” Or a certain popular topically applied product that shall remain nameless. The point isn’t if it works as they claim, it’s whether it works at all, and if so, how? Can it be replicated by a placebo or something that causes a similar sensation?

Just my two cents.

It just won’t be the same.

Then again, this is coming from a guy known as the ‘Mad Bastard’.

So, if one accepts homeopathic principles, isn’t sea water (or diluted sea water) going to be the universal panacea? Either that or so homeopathically toxic that one should explode on contact!

It could of course explain the disintegration of my flip-flops…

Yeah, the advertisers are really going to go for that idea…

I’m not familiar with the work of the co-presenters you listed (and haven’t the opportunity to research right now) but someone above mentioned Penn Jillette. If it were possible for a Jillette type persona to come in with a ‘We’re gonna take woo by the balls’ approach – well, that would be compulsive viewing for me.

Also, please get it on the air for August 2009 as we’ll be dropping by for a fortnight and I know TV will be pretty sparse otherwise.

BigBob

No?… Oh… Just me then.

The Universe is so spectacular and stunningly beautiful, why would anyone *ever* want to bury their head in the sand and miss all that glorious sense of belonging to the fantastic?

(Sigh)… It’s enough to make a deity spontaneously pop into existence.

The 1st thing I thought of was the notion that tiny, invisible creatures live inside us and cause various unpleasant effects. Not Theodoric of York’s theory that a frog had taken up residence in someone’s stomach, but the germ theory of disease. (Technical advances in microscopes, Pasteur’s experiments with sterilized and unsterilized items, epidemiology, etc.) I’m sure there are more recent examples, such as that ulcers are caused by bacteria, which no one believed until quite recently.

Everyone must know about the deep sea ecosystems surrounding volcanic vents by now, but there must be other recent examples.

In non-biological contexts, there are subjects like continental drift and exoplanets, or the missing neutrino problem, or more historically, the problem of the source of the Sun’s energy.

For current unknowns, there are millions (what would it take to prove the existence of life on other planets, in other solar systems? Are we likely to have an answer soon? Does string theory or branes explain anything useful about the universe?)

For things that seemed possible but unlikely, and turned out to be wrong, cold fusion might be a good example.

I’m not saying these things should be the focus of the show, just the sorts of things to be looked at once in a while to show what sorts of evidence skeptics need. I think lots of woo believers just don’t understand what constitutes evidence.

P.S. Safari’s spell checker doesn’t think epidemiology and exoplanets are real words. 2 in one post! I rule!

This is a much needed step.