BMJ  2005;331 (17 December), doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7530.0-f

Editor's choice

Bentham's head

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Not far from the BMJ, near the entrance hall of University College London, sits Jeremy Bentham, the great 18th century educator and benefactor—and the father of utilitarianism. His body was preserved on his own instruction as an "auto-icon" but his head, damaged in the preservation process and for a long time stored under his chair, is now locked away safe from student pranks. The head on his body is made of wax. Why do I mention all this? Because this week's journal echoes Bentham's philosophy—that our aim should be to acheive the greatest good for the greatest number of people. It's a philosophy that seems hard to argue against. But as articles in this week's journal show, the devil is in the detail.

This week we publish the final two articles in the series on cost effective strategies for achieving the millennium development goals (p 1431, p . . . [Full text of this article]

Fiona Godlee, editor

(fgodlee@bmj.com)


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Rapid Responses:

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Bentham must still be grieving, indeed!
BM Hegde
bmj.com, 16 Dec 2005 [Full text]
spelling of trialling
anne p collins
bmj.com, 19 Dec 2005 [Full text]
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