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Which Fortean Mysteries Would You Like To See Solved?

It's always been a disappointment to me that the scientific community basically refuse to investigate things that have been labelled 'Fortean' or 'supernatural'. It seems to me that some of them , if rigorously investigated, might come up with new scientific discoveries that could expand our abilities.
It frustrates me too. But I don't think as badly about those scientists who ignore fortean subjects as many do. It seems to me the salient quality of fortean phenomena is their general infrequency, which condemns them to expression beyond the experiencer as anecdotes, prohibits their replication in the laboratory and makes it easy to dismiss their existence at all. Scientists need funding for experiments, and as much as I'd like to get the lowdown on poltergeist phenomena, I'll wait for someone else to invest in research. There's no real excuse for utterly dismissing phenomena without even bothering to examine the extent and consistent nature of experiences, nor looking at that evidence purely as an exercise in explaining it away.
 
I think many scientists avoid Fortean phenomena like the plague because there's no money in it, and they do have bills to pay. Then there's the chance that they could lose their credibility in the scientific community, and perhaps the majority of scientists have an in-built resistance to anything considered to be 'woo'.
 
It frustrates me too. But I don't think as badly about those scientists who ignore fortean subjects as many do. It seems to me the salient quality of fortean phenomena is their general infrequency, which condemns them to expression beyond the experiencer as anecdotes, prohibits their replication in the laboratory and makes it easy to dismiss their existence at all. Scientists need funding for experiments, and as much as I'd like to get the lowdown on poltergeist phenomena, I'll wait for someone else to invest in research. There's no real excuse for utterly dismissing phenomena without even bothering to examine the extent and consistent nature of experiences, nor looking at that evidence purely as an exercise in explaining it away.

It's why I put dowsing at the head of the list. It is a relatively common thing and many country folk just accept it as a fact of life. Apparently Einstein (of all people) thought it should be investigated.

Edit:

Here is the actual quote
"I know very well that many scientists consider dowsing as a type of ancient superstition. According to my conviction this is, however, unjustified. The dowsing rod is a simple instrument which shows the reaction of the human nervous system to certain factors which are unknown to us at this time."
 
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It frustrates me too. But I don't think as badly about those scientists who ignore fortean subjects as many do. It seems to me the salient quality of fortean phenomena is their general infrequency, which condemns them to expression beyond the experiencer as anecdotes, prohibits their replication in the laboratory and makes it easy to dismiss their existence at all. ...

These characteristics make it difficult to justify research funding now that most such support is awarded on the basis of generating marketable results and / or products.

As time goes on, Fortean phenomena are increasingly relegated to the back burner as discretionary or personally motivated research foci.
 
It's why I put dowsing at the head of the list. It is a relatively common thing and many country folk just accept it as a fact of life. Apparently Einstein (of all people) thought it should be investigated.
I had a science teacher who was an advocate of dowsing. Mind you, he was a renowned nutter. But a good teacher.

I may be remembering incorrectly, but I'm sure Chris French did an experiment in dowsing which appeared on one of Richard Dawkins' programmes. The experiment involved putting planks over containers, some of which contained water, and getting dowsers to walk over them trying to dowse out the water filled containers. I can't say what the entire methodology involved from my memory of that particular programme, but no mention was made of following those dowsers in the usual process of their work to establish whether there was a genuine phenomenon to be studied or how best to replicate those circumstances in laboratory conditions. He just set up an experiment that didn't resemble the situation in which dowsers operate and then condescendingly (as is his way) told us all why we falsely believe things that haven't been scientifically proven. As though he'd somehow disproven dowsing and proven his conclusion. Neither of which he'd achieved. But I don't suppose scientific method is particularly important when you're already convinced what the outcome of the experiment will be.
 
I can't stand Chris French's "sincere" explanations for us simpletons who simply want to believe any old shit. I'm not sure whether his attitude is worse than James Randhi, who at least says it as he sees it; as much of an idiot I think he is.
 
I had a science teacher who was an advocate of dowsing. Mind you, he was a renowned nutter. But a good teacher.

I may be remembering incorrectly, but I'm sure Chris French did an experiment in dowsing which appeared on one of Richard Dawkins' programmes. The experiment involved putting planks over containers, some of which contained water, and getting dowsers to walk over them trying to dowse out the water filled containers. I can't say what the entire methodology involved from my memory of that particular programme, but no mention was made of following those dowsers in the usual process of their work to establish whether there was a genuine phenomenon to be studied or how best to replicate those circumstances in laboratory conditions. He just set up an experiment that didn't resemble the situation in which dowsers operate and then condescendingly (as is his way) told us all why we falsely believe things that haven't been scientifically proven. As though he'd somehow disproven dowsing and proven his conclusion. Neither of which he'd achieved. But I don't suppose scientific method is particularly important when you're already convinced what the outcome of the experiment will be.
That's the trouble exactly. Mainstream archeology, anthropology, geology, historians, paleontology, etc., etc. are dismissive of ideas and even evidences that don't fit into their nice snug theories and conclusions. God help them they might have to re-wright the text books. Plus it's blow to their prestige, we don't want to damage their pride. A scientist can be drummed out his or hers field and have their futures ruined for sticking behind unpopular finding.

One should be open minded sceptic. On the other unfortunately hand is the frauds, sensationalist and profiteers who are all to ready to present false evidences and theories . I wish they would jump off the edge of the planet, figuratively speaking.
 
I studied geology at university. One of the professors talked about his experiments with dowsing. He claimed one type of dowsing was useless, but the other got quite good results. Sadly I don't recall the details.
 
I fooled around with pendulum dowsing when I was younger (along with various other occult and new agey things). I was rubbish! But I taught it to a friend, and he instantly found he could divine which number would be rolled on a die twice in a row. He almost always got the third roll wrong, but always got the first two right. We kept doing it, rolling until he got one wrong, then leaving it for a while, then starting again, with me expecting it would turn out to be a statistical anomaly that would even itself out when he began getting the first rolls wrong all the time, but he didn't. Then we got bored.
 
I'm sure I've read, more than once, on here and elsewhere, that mining companies regularly make use of Dowsers. They don't publicise it a lot, they just do it because it gets results. Similarly with people looking for underground water resources - they get work because they usually come up with the goods.

These are practical people, they're not worried that there's no theoretical back-up for these methods. If it works, they stick with it - let some other b*gger work out the details!

I'm too tired to search for references now (haven't been sleeping well recently) but there's some good stuff out there!
 
Didn't our old friend Uri Geller claim oil companies were using his divining abilities to find large deposits? Maybe that's where he got his fortune from, and it wasn't those crystal sales at all.
 
I'm aware of a Russian group whose purpose is to locate the unmarked graves of victims of the Soviet terror, to record as much information as possible, and to re-inter the remains with due ceremony. They use dowsers to find the unmarked graves, and apparently have never had a false positive. (One grim possibility, though, is that the area they explore is so full of graves that they were bound to find one wherever they dig - that conference was not one of my most cheerful interpreting gigs :(). This was announced in an academic setting, but, I guess as they were all social scientists, it went unremarked.

Apropos of not much, it seems to me that kinesiology has something in common with dowsing - I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that they draw on the same bodily response, whatever it actually is. If burlesque is really just stripping with A levels, is kinesiology dowsing with A-levels?
 
Apropos of not much, it seems to me that kinesiology has something in common with dowsing - I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that they draw on the same bodily response, whatever it actually is. If burlesque is really just stripping with A levels, is kinesiology dowsing with A-levels?

It may very well be so. I've found playing with dowsing rods to be great fun. Dowsing for water where I am right now isn't very challenging, as we are directly over a large aquifer, but wandering around with the rods (just regular old bent wire hangers, in my case) and seeing how they react is neat.

The way the rods feel when they spin around is reminiscent of the wedding ring - pendulum trick, but without consciously asking the rods to move in a certain way. This suggests to me that there is something similar going on with nerve impulses and the like. Which makes it no less fascinating, by the way. :)
 
which shows the reaction of the human nervous system to certain factors which are unknown to us at this time."

That is it in a nutshell Cochise - all our divination really is, is using something as an indicator to what the body, or mind is picking up.

The Old People in Australia have the 'bush telegraph' where a twitch of a muscle or an ache tells them that they need to get in contact with that specific person - and nine times out of ten, they are right.
 
That is it in a nutshell Cochise - all our divination really is, is using something as an indicator to what the body, or mind is picking up.
I posted something similar on this MB (probably several years ago on a thread with Dowsing in the title), suggesting that forked twigs, bent rods, pendulums, etc, act as amplifiers for minute and unconscious bodily reactions when the dowser gets close to the object of interest.
 
I posted something similar on this MB (probably several years ago on a thread with Dowsing in the title), suggesting that forked twigs, bent rods, pendulums, etc, act as amplifiers for minute and unconscious bodily reactions when the dowser gets close to the object of interest.

Exactly. Not woo (probably) but nevertheless something undocumented and potentially useful, if only it was taken seriously.
 
The Old People in Australia have the 'bush telegraph' where a twitch of a muscle or an ache tells them that they need to get in contact with that specific person - and nine times out of ten, they are right.
My Mum can tell when rain is about to fall. She usually complains of pains in her legs, and then mutters 'rain's on the way'.
She's mostly been right too.
 
My Mum can tell when rain is about to fall. She usually complains of pains in her legs, and then mutters 'rain's on the way'.
She's mostly been right too.


My hands Mytho - from years of riding bikes in the rain.
 
You can definitely and finally know the cause of one Fortean mystery. Not stuff like is there a god? But a specific incident or series of incidents?


Nessie? Was there a gunman on the Grassy Knoll? Mary Celeste? John Titor? SkinWalker Ranch?

What would you pick and why?
 
The case of the four boys said to have been attacked and killed by a sea serpent of the coast of Florida in the early 1960s.
Survivor Edward Brian McCleary claims a green, serpentine monster killed the other boys after their raft was swept out to sea. Why make up such an outlandish story if they just drowned?
 
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