Lynne McTaggart (born 23 January 1951, in New York City) is an American
alternative medicine activist, lecturer, journalist, author, and publisher. She is the author of six books, including ''The Intention Experiment'' and ''The Field''. According to her author profile, she is a spokesperson "on consciousness, the new physics, and the practices of conventional and alternative medicine."
McTaggart is
anti-vaccinationist.
She promotes this belief in her book ''What Doctors Don't Tell You'' and in other publications.
This has drawn significant criticism of her work and has created controversy.
Her ideas are widely criticized as
pseudoscience
Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable clai ...
.
Career
In her autobiography McTaggart reports that after recovering from an illness using
alternative medical approaches her husband suggested she start a newsletter on the risks of some medical practices and devised the title: "What Doctors Don't Tell You". In 1996 McTaggart published the book with the same name.
She and her husband set up a public company in 2001, ''What Doctors Don't Tell You plc'', later ''Conatus plc'', which published newsletters, magazines and audio-tapes based on conferences and seminars including, ''What Doctors Don't Tell You'', ''PROOF!'', and ''Living the Field''.
This company was
wound up
Liquidation is the process in accounting by which a company is brought to an end in Canada, United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, and many other countries. The assets and property of the company are redistrib ...
in 2009.
A new company, ''Wddty Publishing Ltd'', run by McTaggart and her husband, took over the ''What Doctors Don't Tell You'' website, and ''New Age Publishing Ltd'' for McTaggart's other publishing and public-speaking activities. Publication of their monthly magazine ''What Doctors Don't Tell You'' restarted in August 2012, in a glossy format aimed at newsagent and high-street distribution, instead of using the previous subscription model, and carrying paid advertising, something McTaggart had originally said WDDTY would not do.
In her book ''The Field'', McTaggart asserts that the universe is unified by an interactive field. The book has been translated into fourteen languages.
In a later book, ''The Intention Experiment'', she discusses research in the field of human
consciousness
Consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience and awareness of internal and external existence. However, the lack of definitions has led to millennia of analyses, explanations and debates by philosophers, theologians, linguisticians, and scien ...
which she says supports the theory that "the universe is connected by a vast quantum
energy field" and can be influenced by thought.
Michael Shermer
Michael Brant Shermer (born September 8, 1954) is an American science writer, historian of science, executive director of The Skeptics Society, and founding publisher of ''Skeptic'' magazine, a publication focused on investigating pseudoscientifi ...
states that this belief is contradicted by conflicting evidence (e.g.
studies on intercessory prayer).
McTaggart has a
personal-development program called "Living The Field" which is based on an idiosyncratic interpretation of the
zero point field as applied to
quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistr ...
. She appears in the extended version of the movie ''
What the Bleep Do We Know!?
''What the Bleep Do We Know!?'' (stylized as ''What tнē #$*! D̄ө ωΣ (k)πow!?'' and ''What the #$*! Do We Know!?'') is a 2004 American pseudo-scientific film that posits a spiritual connection between quantum physics and consciousness. The ...
'', (2004).
From 1996 until 2002 McTaggart and her husband Bryan Hubbard published the monthly newsletter ''Mother Knows Best'', later renamed ''Natural Parent magazine'', focusing on
home schooling
Homeschooling or home schooling, also known as home education or elective home education (EHE), is the education of school-aged children at home or a variety of places other than a school. Usually conducted by a parent, tutor, or an onlin ...
, environmental and health concerns, including nutrition and
homeopathy. They also published related books: ''My Learning Child'', ''My Spiritual Child'' and ''My Healthy Child''.
Significant portions of her book about
Kathleen Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington
Kathleen Agnes Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington (' Kennedy; February 20, 1920 – May 13, 1948), also known as "Kick" Kennedy, was an American socialite. She was the second daughter of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and Rose Kennedy as well as a si ...
appeared without attribution
or permission in ''The Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys: An American Saga'' (1987), by historian
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Doris Helen Kearns Goodwin (born January 4, 1943) is an American biographer, historian, former sports journalist, and political commentator. She has written biographies of several U.S. presidents, including ''Lyndon Johnson and the American Drea ...
. Goodwin eventually resolved the matter with a public apology to McTaggart and a "substantial" monetary settlement.
[
]
Views
''What Doctors Don't Tell You'' has been cited for factual errors in its attacks on medicine, such as confusing the antiviral drug
Tamiflu
Oseltamivir, sold under the brand name Tamiflu, is an antiviral medication used to treat and prevent influenza A and influenza B, viruses that cause the flu. Many medical organizations recommend it in people who have complications or are at hi ...
for a vaccine and attributing deaths to a nonexistent
avian influenza
Avian influenza, known informally as avian flu or bird flu, is a variety of influenza caused by viruses adapted to birds. vaccine.
Ben Goldacre
Ben Michael Goldacre (born 20 May 1974) is a British physician, academic and science writer. He is the first Bennett Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine and director of the Bennett Institute for Applied Data Science at the University of Oxford ...
has described McTaggart as "viciously, viciously anti-vaccine"
and notes that "In a radical move, even for the vaccine fear-mongering community, this time she has people dying from a vaccine that ''doesn’t actually exist''".
''The Field'' has been characterized by Mark Henderson of ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...
'' as
pseudoscience
Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable clai ...
, focusing on her personal understanding of quantum physics as a misconception.
McTaggart was reported to have threatened to sue
Simon Singh
Simon Lehna Singh, (born 19 September 1964) is a British popular science author, theoretical and particle physicist. His written works include ''Fermat's Last Theorem'' (in the United States titled ''Fermat's Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve th ...
after he contacted Comag, the distributors of WDDTY, complaining that the magazine was "largely unscientific" and "promoting advice that could potentially harm readers." "Also, many of the adverts appear to make pseudoscientific and unsubstantiated claims," he said. "I even offered to meet with Comag and introduce them to medical experts, but they have not accepted this invitation. When I suggested that I would blog about our email exchange, their reaction was to tell me in no uncertain terms: 'I should inform you that we have sought legal advice in respect of this matter. We would take any attempts to damage our reputation on social media or elsewhere very seriously.'"
In the months between first publication of ''What Doctors Don't Tell You'' in magazine form, and February 2013, 54 breaches of the Code of Advertising Practice in 11 adverts were adjudicated and upheld by the
Advertising Standards Authority along with a further 11 informally resolved cases, concerning adverts in the first two issues,
[WDDTY #9 - Taking Stock]
''Nightingale Collaboration'', 27 Feb 2013 with more breaches in subsequent issues too.
In an interview on
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...
, GP and author
Margaret McCartney
Margaret Mary McCartney is a general practitioner, freelance writer and broadcaster based in Glasgow, Scotland. McCartney is a vocal advocate for evidence-based medicine. McCartney was a regular columnist at the '' British Medical Journal''. Sh ...
stated: "I'm astounded that Lynne thinks this is an evidence-based publication. It's anything but," she said. "The problem with evidence is that it can tell you things that you'd rather not know. A lot of the time medicine does do harm but that's why doctors and scientists are duty-bound to put their research findings out there and to stop doing things that cause harm. What we shouldn't do is abandon medicine and the scientific method and go straight for alternative medicine with no good evidence that that works either."
She criticised stories in the magazine as "absolute rubbish" and "ridiculously alarmist".
In an article in The Times in October 2013 Tom Whipple, science correspondent, said that "Experts are calling on high street shops to stop selling a magazine that claims that
vitamin C
Vitamin C (also known as ascorbic acid and ascorbate) is a water-soluble vitamin found in citrus and other fruits and vegetables, also sold as a dietary supplement and as a topical 'serum' ingredient to treat melasma (dark pigment spots) ...
cures
HIV
The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of ''Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the immune ...
, suggests homeopathy could treat cancer and implies that the
cervical cancer vaccine
A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious or malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verified. has killed hundreds of girls."
Personal life
McTaggart is married to publisher Bryan Hubbard and lives in London with her two daughters.
Works
* ''Kathleen Kennedy: Her Life and Times'' (1983)
* ''What Doctors Don't Tell You: The Truth About The Dangers Of Modern Medicine'' (1999)
* ''The Cancer Handbook: What's Really Working'' (2000)
* ''The Field: The Quest for the Secret Force of the Universe'' (2003)
* ''The Intention Experiment: Using Your Thoughts to Change Your Life and the World'' (2007)
* ''The Bond: Connecting through the Space Between Us'' (2011)
* ''The Power of Eight: Harnessing the Miraculous Energies of a Small Group to Heal Others, Your Life, and the World'' (2017)
References
External links
Lynne McTaggart's umbrella website*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:McTaggart, Lynne
1951 births
Living people
Alternative cancer treatment advocates
Alternative medicine activists
American anti-vaccination activists
British health and wellness writers
Nautilus Book Award winners
People from Wimbledon, London
Quantum mysticism advocates