Masaru Emoto – Messages from Water
Name: Masaru Emoto
DOB: July 22, 1943.
Occupation: Writer
Education: Yokohama Municipal University, Open International University for Alternative Medicine (unaccredited)

Masaru Emoto’s Research
Masaru Emoto is the author of Messages from Water. He has documented in this book his discovery of the formation of water crystals through the influence of human speech, thoughts, prayers, songs and even pictures.

Heavy metal music-------------------"Thank you"

Why Emoto is a Psuedo Scientist
Now Emoto’s work is pretty incredible, isn’t it? Amazing as it might sound, I think there are too many problems and loop holes in his research to quantify his claims as legitimate. And I’m not the only one. Scientists do not recognize Emoto’s work as authentic due to many reasons.

First of all, let us look at Emoto’s credentials. He graduated from an unaccredited institution. As much as this doesn’t support the fact that he isn’t credible, I think we should keep this in mind as we move along.
Next, let us look at Emoto’s occupation. A writer. Hmm. He had no scientific background and he did not conduct his experiments in certain necessary conditions. His research and experiments had insufficient experimental controls, and double-blind trials were not conducted. What this means is, the photographers knew what they were looking for when the snapped the pictures of the crystals, and Emoto explained that the creativity of the photographers was valued more than the rigor of the experiments.

According to an interview with John Woodhouse published in the Maui News, Emoto stated, “I did not start out with any modern scientific background. I did not even know the limit of science to stop me from giving this research a chance.” This statement alone is enough to dub Emoto as a pseudo scientist. He was not educated in the scientific community, and I believe that together with his artistic view of things in general, his “research” was made biased through the many mistakes committed.

Here are some of the mistakes made by Emoto:
1) He did not take into account of the effects physical phenomenons would have on the formation of the water crystals. Numerous environmental factors such as the most fundamental of all – temperature and humidity were not considered in his research. Factors like these would have substantial impact on the results of his study but Emoto did not conduct procedures to control them.

2) The Petri dishes used to contain the water samples were not sealed. The implication is that the samples used in his experiments could easily be contaminated by the environment or even the researcher himself. One good example would be that the photographer’s breath could affect the warming rate of the frozen samples, thereby affecting the temperature of the crystal formations. This implies that the beautiful crystals formed through “positive words” could have been mere coincidence.

3) Emoto indicated that his water samples were frozen at 25°C, and his crystals were formed at -5°C. According to the morphology diagram of ice crystal formation (Libbrecht), column crystals should be formed instead of plate crystals, yet none of Emoto’s pictures show a column crystal. Could Emoto have fabricated his findings? Let’s put it this way – he has no supportive data to back his claims.

4) Emoto has mentioned that in every test he would photograph 100 Petri dish samples, yet only one of each test was provided to the public. What if the other 99 went against his hypothesis? He has successfully prevented the media from uncovering the photos which did not support his research.
There was a lack of blind and double-blind procedures in Emoto’s experiments. Emoto believed that “the researcher’s aesthetic sense and character is the most important aspect when taking crystal photographs.” Let me rephrase this- The researcher photographs whatever supports his claims. An example of how Emoto could have added more credibility to his findings would be letting the photographers snap the pictures without first knowing what samples the Petri dishes contained. In this way, the photographer is “blind” and does not know what he’s looking for. Sadly, this crucial trial was ignored by Emoto.

Masaru Emoto would continue to be ignored by the scientific community if he does not prove his claims with better experimental controls, or disclose his methods to other scientist to allow further research. The lack of scientific evidence has ruled his findings as pseudo science, but I think he makes a good science fiction writer. I’d be first in line if he publishes his first science fiction novel.

As much as I shun Emoto’s dubious scientific claims, I have to say that he started his research work with a good cause. And I believe it is very true that whatever you say and think affect the people around you. No doubt about that, but Emoto’s research would only make a good bedtime read till he can further prove his claims.