Is Masaru Emoto's Water Experiment Science or Pseudoscience?

[cybermonsters]

http://www.masaru-emoto.net/japanese/jphoto.html - Photo
http://www.masaru-emoto.net/english/entop.html

When water is subjected to Vivaldi's Four Seasons, it takes on the appearance of a beautiful snowflake. When subjected to heavy metal music it takes on a hideous forum. When the word "love" is taped to a jar of water, it becomes a beautiful snowflake. When the words "I hate you, I want to kill you" are taped to a jar of water, it takes on a hideous form.


"Dr" Emoto's website: http://www.hado.net/

Refudiation from UC Santa Cruz particle physicist Bruce Schumm
http://www.badthinking.com/blog/archives/2005/03/ugly_words_crea.html

Dr. Emoto claims his research has been submitted to 150 peer reviewed journals. I have hired Google Answers to find just ONE submission to an accredited US peer reviewed scientific journal.

I belong to a church that this man is speaking at all around the US. I would like very much to bring him down with hard scientific evidence. It's a sham.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

It's a sham.

Thanks for your post. I had never heard about this one.

 

[Kakarot]

uhh it looks like random crystals form in there and then you go searching for one that suits your needs and go "hey look satan formed when i played marylin manson!". they don't show a wide sample of crystals from the same sample lol

 

[cybermonsters]

I have found that he was accepted into one peer reviewed journal, albeit alternative medicine. I have ordered it and will try to read through it best I can and let you know what I find. Admittedly I am way out of my league reading scientific research on my own like this.

 

[cybermonsters]

I have reviewed the article. It was a "photo essay" submitted to the
The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine
Volume 10, Number 1, 2004 pp. 19-21
Photo Essay
Healing With Water by Masaru Emoto, M.D.

Although this is a peer reviewed journal, his particular entry it seems was not reviewed as it as not even submitted as a scientific article. It is indeed a photo essay comparable to a high school science project. It can be downloaded at liebertonline.com for $29

I enlisted the help of Google Answers to even find his submission. The details of those conversations are at http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=511382#a

Believe it or not he is traveling the world and making big bucks with his water show. Does anyone know how I can go about having the experiment duplicated? I can't print his article because it's copyrighted. But all you need is water samples, a photographic microscope from 200x to 500x, masking tape, pen, freezer able to keep steady temperature at -5 Celsius.

 

[The Rev]

I wonder if he can do something about light beer...

$$:)$$

The Rev

 

[google]

I have actually seen this guy's book, he is trying to state water is a "living" sentient thing (having no other words to put there). So he says water gives different responses to the various stimuli. My response to his book was "ooo pretty pictures" considering it was written in japanese lol. But even if vibrations could influence the crystal structure of water I would doubt it would be so dramatic and personified.

Second thing is, let's look at the cooky side of things. Ok for arguement's sake I accept water is living and is sentient (and all that..) but why would it demonstrate a reaction which is so human..making faces. That just doesn't add up, if you start singing at a dog it will bark but not say "dont quite your day job".

 

[zoobyshoe]

Masaru Emoto's Website
Address:http://www.masaru-emoto.net/english/etruth.html

I was poking around his site and read something called "Why the corpses of crows are never found" at the above link. His belief seems to be that most animals are taken bodily into the spiritual plane after death, leaving no corpse. For some odd reason he doesn't seem to have heard of the process of decay.

 

[Adam Orenstein]

Why is Emoto as popular as he is?

No one has yet mentioned that he has received a lot of publicity because he was one of the "experts" spoken to in the widely seen movie "What the <Bleep>". The movie was actually an interesting take, and a nice presentation of some of the older ideas of books like Capra's Tao of Physics, reconciling Eastern religious thoughts and science. But some of the opinions were presented uncritically, and some of them, like Masaru Emoto's, certainly need intensive debunking.

 

[kcballer21]

When water is subjected to Vivaldi's Four Seasons, it takes on the appearance of a beautiful snowflake. When subjected to heavy metal music it takes on a hideous forum. When the word "love" is taped to a jar of water, it becomes a beautiful snowflake. When the words "I hate you, I want to kill you" are taped to a jar of water, it takes on a hideous form.

I wonder what happens if you play a heavy metal song... that is also a love song?

http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/shared/downloads/KillswitchEngage/KsE-RoseOfSharyn.mp3

I thought I saw this debunked in this forum, but I guess not. That link posted by cybermonster is a good one

 

[champ2823]

Isn't that kinda similar to clouds. Sometimes people say they see the devil's face or something in a cloud formation. But can't you find anything you want in a cloud with a little imagination and if you stare up at the sky long enough. and I dunno, but when I listen to Vivaldi's Four Seasons, since its such a great peace, I feel a sense of happiness and tranquility anyway.

 

[PIT2]

Here are 2 videos of Masura Emoto and his water stuff:

video 1: http://www.untoldmysteries.com/Real...ater-Prof-Masuru-Emoto-(9,29Mb)-12min39min.rm

video 2: http://www.untoldmysteries.com/Real...ater-Prof-Masuru-Emoto-(8,97Mb)-11min59min.rm

 

[SGT]

The photos show a distorted ice crystal provenient from polluted water and a wonderful snowflake obtained from the same water, after a prayer.
I would like to know if Dr. Emoto would drink from the prayed polluted water.

 

[Curious3141]

I would like to know if Dr. Emoto would drink from the prayed polluted water.

He would be spewing filth from both ends instead of just the one he talks through.

 

[matthyaouw]

The photos show a distorted ice crystal provenient from polluted water and a wonderful snowflake obtained from the same water, after a prayer.
I would like to know if Dr. Emoto would drink from the prayed polluted water.

Polluted water? You mean he adds a number of different freezing nuclei to water and is surprised they have an effect on crystal formation?

 

[SGT]

Polluted water? You mean he adds a number of different freezing nuclei to water and is surprised they have an effect on crystal formation?

Exactly! Look at some pictures of crystals at This site.
Photo 3 shows the irregular shape obtained by freezing polluted water, while photo 4 shows a crystal obtained from the same water after fusion of the ice and prayer from a budhist monk.
I am not an expert in the subject, but I believe that after freezing the pollutants were separated from the water, so that when it was frozen again the several freezing nuclei were not present anymore. The pryer has nothing to do with it.
As for the ice formed while submited to hard rock music, I believe that the agitation of the molecules did affect the crystal formation.

 

[paintergirl]

There is a spiritualist coming to my town Sunday. He will bless a polluted river in an attempt to affect its nature as was (perhaps) demonstrated in Emoto's water experiments.

I don't expect any questions to be answered scientifically, however is there anything you would like me to watch for and report back on as I attend the event?

 

[SGT]

There is a spiritualist coming to my town Sunday. He will bless a polluted river in an attempt to affect its nature as was (perhaps) demonstrated in Emoto's water experiments.

I don't expect any questions to be answered scientifically, however is there anything you would like me to watch for and report back on as I attend the event?

You could ask for the guy to drink the blessed water.

 

[paintergirl]

Just to follow up- I can't give any eye-witness account of water changing form.
The spritualist spent so much time promoting himself that no one I know stayed late enough to see him bless the river...

Anyone surprised by this should send me 50 cents.

 

[J77]

Good job they called the film, "What the bleep".

Anyone with an ounce of sense wouldn't use the 'bleep' in amazement but it a, "Why did I spend time watching that rubbish" kind of way.

This film's even advertised as having something to do with quantum physics

Though, my gf did try to make me some 'happy' water by sticking post-it notes on the bottles

Shockingly absurd film, anyone seen the recent sequel?

 

[PIT2]

This week an article appeared in newscientist (preview)in which weird quantum effects of water were discussed. Masuru Emoto was also mentioned, as well as homeopathy. They said that the idea that water might have a memory might not be such newage nonsense as people often claim. The article isn't available online but i read it in the shops and they used the word "epitaxi". Does anyone know what this is?

 

[koantum]

Why don't you go directly to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_beam_epitaxy" or ask Google, which lists the Wikipedia article first?

 

[koantum]

Shockingly absurd film

Have a look at http://koantum.blogspot.com/2006_04_09_koantum_archive.html" in my blog koantum matters.

 

[PIT2]

Why don't you go directly to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_beam_epitaxy" or ask Google, which lists the Wikipedia article first?

The article spoke of epitaxi, not epitaxy and i don't know if they are the same. It said something like that properties of hydrogen could be passed on to each other. There was also talk about the zero-point-vibrations between hydrogen atoms and the way they have been found to rotate in a particular way around specific segments of DNA.

Here is also one of the papers that was referred to:

In the following, experimental data are presented from various laboratories treating the liquid state of common elements [1-7]. The goal of this paper is not only to demonstrate that the scientific world’s picture of the structure of the liquid state is grossly oversimplified, but to suggest certain common features of the structural variability.
http://www.materials-technology.co.uk/mri/abstract.php?pid=416

 

[koantum]

Check Webster's online dictionary for http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/ep/epitaxy.html" . The word "epitaxi" doesn't appear to exist in the English language except as part of "epitaxial" etc.

 

[Tojen]

What self-respecting scientist would call them water crystals? There's no such thing. They're ice crystals.

I'm surprised he gets any "happy" crystals. Most "living sentient" things don't take kindly to freezing solid, however well they've been treated.

Do we have to watch our language around water now? If water is a "living sentient" thing, do its rights need to be protected? Do we need to train water psychologists? Will there be TV Marathons of Hope for Water? ("Right now, somewhere in the world, water is being traumatized. Stop the madness by sending your donation to...") How about water pets for the kids? ("Dad, Aqua evaporated out of his bowl." "That's too bad, son. I guess he just wanted to be free.")

I wonder if he can do something about light beer...

Better yet, if we put beer labels on bottles of water, we should have Perrier pilsner by morning.

Does anyone know how I can go about having the experiment duplicated? I can't print his article because it's copyrighted. But all you need is water samples, a photographic microscope from 200x to 500x, masking tape, pen, freezer able to keep steady temperature at -5 Celsius.

"The Procedure of Water Crystal Experiment..." (step-by-step with photos)

http://www.hado.net/procedures.html

 

[hypatia]

or you could go to make-a-flake at http://snowflakes.lookandfeel.com/

 

[J77]

Have a look at http://koantum.blogspot.com/2006_04_09_koantum_archive.html" in my blog koantum matters.

Nice

 

[Highwaister]

Debunking Emoto

Caught your thread and thought you might be interested in this Article, abstract of which is below:

I found it at the following blog:

http://deanradin.blogspot.com/2006/10/effects-of-distant-intention-on-water.html

In my opinion, while flawed this sort of stuff is a start .We need much more of this sort of stuff, preferably without Emoto's involvement, before we can say that Emoto is talking nonsense. Need to bring scientific rigor open minds and less bias / prejudiceto to this whole mind/matter issue.

btw I have no association to the guy behing this blog / research. Just saw it and thought this would be a useful forum from which to get feedback. I have read emoto's book and also find it hard to take, but then so did the 'flat-earthers' etcEffects of distant intention on water crystals

Here is the quote and abstract from the blog:

"Some people, when faced with claims like Dr. Emoto's "intention affects the formation of water cystals," immediately dismiss it as nonsense. Others uncritically accept the claim because it sounds nice. My first reaction is to try to replicate the claim to see it for myself. I conducted such a test with Dr. Emoto, where he and his staff were kept blind as to which bottles of water had been treated. The paper reporting the experiment has just come out. Here's the abstract:

DOUBLE-BLIND TEST OF THE EFFECTS OF DISTANT INTENTION ON WATER CRYSTAL FORMATION

The hypothesis that water “treated” with intention can affect ice crystals formed from that water was pilot tested under double-blind conditions. A group of approximately 2,000 people in Tokyo focused positive intentions towards water samples located inside an electromagnetically shielded room in California. That group was unaware of similar water samples set aside in a different location as controls. Ice crystals formed from both sets of water samples were blindly identified and photographed by an analyst, and the resulting images were blindly assessed for aesthetic appeal by 100 independent judges. Results indicated that crystals from the treated water were given higher scores for aesthetic appeal than those from the control water (p = 0.001, one-tailed), lending support to the hypothesis.

Citation: Radin, D. I., Hayssen, G., Emoto, M., & Kizu, T. (2006). Explore, September/October 2006, Vol. 2, No. 5.

A triple-blind replication of this effect is presently underway.
posted by Dean Radin at 8:39 PM "



Comments Please!

 

[Evo]

Caught your thread and thought you might be interested in this Article, abstract of which is below:

I found it at the following blog:

http://deanradin.blogspot.com/2006/10/effects-of-distant-intention-on-water.html

Comments Please!

A crackpot reviewing a crackpot! This has already been posted in another thread. Radin is considered to be a nut himself.

 

[PIT2]

I haven't seen anything that would imply Radin is a crackpot. What makes u say so?

 

[Evo]

I haven't seen anything that would imply Radin is a crackpot. What makes u say so?

Because it's well known that he's a sandwich short of a picnic.

"The new material includes interviews with a crackpot parapsychologist (Dean Radin, from the “Institute of Noetic Sciences”), and a crackpot journalist (Lynne McTaggart). It also includes some new animations featuring a cartoon character (Captain Quantum or some such). The first of these starts off with a not-bad depiction of the two-slit experiment before getting silly. The second is tacked on near the end and brings in a new exciting idea that wasn’t in the first film: Extra Dimensions! Captain Quantum liberates some poor fellow cartoon character who is trapped in 2d due to her fearfulness, bringing her to enlightenment by showing her that there is a third dimension. There’s mercifully little about string theory, mostly John Hagelin going on about how the superstring field is the field of consciousness."

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?m=200602&paged=2

The "Institute of Noetic Sciences" is on the Quackwatch list of questionable organizations.

http://www.quackwatch.org/04ConsumerEducation/nonrecorg.html

 

[PIT2]

Someone on some blog writes he is a crackpot. It doesn't mean much. Obviously in the controversial field Radin does his work, people will respond in such a manner, especially those who hold different worldviews. But in the end, such accusations are meaningless.

Has he been exposed as a fraud, or anything like that?

 

[setAI]

there is a fine line between fringe science and crackpottery- Dean Radin is one of those that rides right on the edge of that boundary to crankville- but he does manage to maintain scientific integrity-

 

[Highwaister]

debunking emoto

So if we are agreed (sort of...) that he's not a crackpot, where does that leave the validity of this study. Does anyone know of any independent replications?