Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) as intense, perhaps Aspie?

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“ . . . Mr. Bentham, author of the “Panopticon,” and sundry other light and amusing books, never sits at the table above a certain number of minutes; when the proper time has elapsed, he rises up, walks out into the middle of the room, and, clasping his hands together behind his back, ducks his head down several times, and runs around the room, repeating without ceasing, the same operation; and this he calls performing a vibration.”

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=83 ... tham&hl=en
The Public Ledger, and Newfoundland General Advertiser, May 13, 1828, page 4.

Any chance the authors of that piece were being facetious? Whatever else you can say about the Panopticon, being "light" and "amusing" it isn't...

PANOPTICON; OR THE INSPECTION-HOUSE

In fact, I've seen the term used to describe our present-day, always under surveillance society. And the whole mummified corpse thing in a glass box he did to himself upon his death is too oogie for words. Apparently for a while the corpse was actually wheeled out of the case and brought to certain meetings of some college or other.

Certainly looks that way. Googling "Jeremy Bentham autistic" (without the quotes) brings up several essays arguing the same point.

Yes, I think that part is certainly being joking and facetious. And also, Jeremy Bentham's

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PRINCIPLES OF MORALS AND LEGISLATION

is not exactly "light" reading either!

About whether Jeremy wrote, stimmed, wrote, stimmed . . . I tend to think that he did. Although it's a newspaper 180 years plus old (which I think is kind of neat in and of itself! ), so it's very hard to get the context. I think we're going to have to be satisfied with a partial answer.

Yeah, the part with the mummified corpse is pretty boogie oogie. I think Jeremy described himself as a rationalist and, according to one source, also first donated his corpse for medical dissection. at the time only executed criminals could be legally dissected. And his example helped bring about a change where people were more allowed to donate their bodies to medical science and/or it became more accepted. Again, according to this one source.

All the same, the part with his body being wheeled out for meetings . . . Wow. Maybe he wanted to tell a good joke or a good whim that went past his lifespan? It is pretty different!

Jeremy Bentham was two centuries ahead of his time as far as full rights for gay persons. But, probably out of fear of social ostracism, doesn’t sound like he did much in England, although he probably had some correspondence with Continental reformers. (Plus, Jeremy wrote a lot of stuff on a variety of topics he never published.) One lesson I draw from this is the importance of having even a handful of supporters and colleagues. It is usually very difficult going it alone, and it is also usually unnecessary.

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an encyclopedia of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, & queer culture
Bentham, Jeremy, page 2
http://www.glbtq.com/literature/bentham_j,2.html

“ . . . The twenty-five pages of miscellaneous fragments Bentham wrote in 1774 take note of the intensity of English antihomosexual sentiment and contrast this with the tolerance of ancient Greece and Rome. In 1785, Bentham prepared a formal essay in a polished and coherent style, apparently meant for circulation. It is not clear what prompted this unique effort. Under the stimulus of treatises by Cesare Beccaria, Montesquieu, and Voltaire, law reform had received a powerful stimulus in Europe.

“Nevertheless, in some rough manuscript notes preceding his essay, Bentham expresses his private anxiety about writing on this topic and dramatically reveals the distance of his perceptions from his countrymen's. "On this subject," he writes, "a man may indulge his spleen without control. Cruelty and intolerance, the most odious and mischievous passions in human nature, screen themselves behind a mask of virtue."

“Perhaps Bentham prepared the essay for circulation among his French disciples since it seems especially to address continental opinion. We do not know if it helped persuade members of the French Constituent Assembly to decriminalize sodomy (hitherto a capital crime) in the revolutionary Code Pénal of 1791. Voltaire and Montesquieu had both opposed the death penalty for sodomy but had seen social dangers in its practice. Voltaire speculated that it was a threat to population, Montesquieu feared its effeminizing influence might weaken a nation's military strength.

“In reply, Bentham gives instances of tolerant societies that suffered from overpopulation, and cites Julius Caesar and such Greek generals as Agesilaus, Xenophon, Themistocles, Aristides, Alcibiades, and Alexander as instances of bisexual men whose military prowess was remarkable.

“Bentham regarded prejudice against homosexuals simply as an irrational hatred and antipathy. It is one of the distinctions of his later writings (from 1814 on) that he identifies what we now call homophobia and directs his efforts to analyzing it. In Bentham's view, it was this negative bias that needed explanation, not the phenomenon of same-sex desire. He finds its origin in religious asceticism inspired by the superstitious fear of a vengeful deity and in the desire of men who lead profligate lives to gain a reputation for virtue by damning a sin they are not inclined to. . . ”

University College London, The Bentham Project
all inequality is a source of evil
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/Bentham-Project/pu ... uality.pdf

“ . . . Bentham’s solution to this problem is a representative democracy, where officials are genuinely accountable to the people, primarily through the operation of open government.

“Bentham argued in favour of gender equality. He wanted women to have equal voting rights with men.

“He argued in favour of equality between sexual orientations. He demanded the decriminalization of acts of ‘sexual non-conformity’.

“Bentham argued against inequality on grounds of race and religion. He advocated the repeal of laws which discriminated against Jews, Muslims, and non-orthodox Christians. He called for the ‘euthanasia’ of the Church of England and the abandonment of religious tests at the two Church-of-England universities, Oxford and Cambridge.

“It was these concerns which led Bentham’s supporters to establish the University of London (soon afterwards renamed University College London) in 1826, and to promote Bentham’s vision of useful learning accessible to all. The new University opened higher education to those excluded from Oxford and Cambridge, admitting students irrespective of race, class, or religion. It later became the first English university to admit women on equal terms with men.”