The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
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List of the most influential people in Philosophy,
#6101
Frank H. De Jong
#128178
Overall Influence
#6102
Robert Austrian
#42616
Overall Influence
1916 - 2007 (91 years)
Robert Austrian was an Americann infectious diseases physician and, along with Maxwell Finland, one of the two most important researchers into the biology of Streptococcus pneumoniae in the 20th century.
Go to Profile#6103
Seth M. Holmes
#38960
Overall Influence
1975 - Present (51 years)
Seth M. Holmes is Chancellor's Professor of Environmental Science, Policy and Management and Medical Anthropology at the University of California Berkeley. He also serves as founder and co-chair of the Berkeley Center for Social Medicine, co-director of the MD/Ph.D. Track in Medical Anthropology coordinated between UC Berkeley and UCSF. A cultural anthropologist and physician, Holmes focuses on social inequalities, immigration, ethnic hierarchies, health and health care. His work has provided a particularly strong ethnographic critique of behaviorism in medicine.
Go to Profile#6104
Hans-gu ̈ Nther Beger
#128182
Overall Influence
#6105
Amit‐ Bar‐or
#128188
Overall Influence
#6106
Clement Joseph Mcdonald
#128201
Overall Influence
#6107
Warren G. Guntheroth
#128203
Overall Influence
#6108
Julie Parsonnet
#73088
Overall Influence
Julie Parsonnet is an infectious disease expert. She is a Fellow of the National Academy of Medicine and American Society for Clinical Investigation. Early life and education Parsonnet grew up in Millburn, New Jersey alongside father Victor Parsonnet and attended Millburn High School. Following high school, she graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a bachelor's degree in history and science. As a sophomore at Harvard, she spent a summer as an intern with Senator Clifford P. Case.
Go to Profile#6109
Hirofumi Yasue†
#128217
Overall Influence
#6110
Pravin M. Shah
#128219
Overall Influence
#6111
John Moriarty
#54724
Overall Influence
1938 - 2007 (69 years)
John Moriarty was an Irish writer and philosopher. A native of County Kerry, he was educated in Listowel and at University College Dublin. In 1974, he moved to England from Canada where he had taught English literature at the University of Manitoba, and subsequently became a live-in gardener in the Carmelite monastery at Boars Hill, Oxford.
Go to Profile#6112
Joseph Berger
#106756
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (75 years)
Joseph R. Berger is an American internist and neurologist who is known for his research interests in progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy , the neurological complications of HIV/AIDS, multiple sclerosis, and other inflammatory disorders of the brain. Particularly, he contributed research on why PML occurs more frequently in AIDS than in other immunosuppressive conditions.
Go to Profile#6113
Gaetano Di Chiara
#128284
Overall Influence
#6114
Jacques Garelli
#98287
Overall Influence
1931 - 2014 (83 years)
Jacques Garelli was a French-language poet and philosopher, author of more than fifteen works. Biography A former UNESCO expert in Zaire with the historian of Africa Aurelio Pace, the father of the artist Joseph Pace, he taught at Yale University , New York University and Amiens University . Influenced by the thought of Martin Heidegger and of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, the main object of his philosophical research remains phenomenology and ontology.
Go to Profile#6115
Matthew Raymond Smith
#128287
Overall Influence
#6116
George G. Rowe
#128294
Overall Influence
#6117
Albrecht Riethmüller
#79775
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Albrecht Riethmüller is a German musicologist. Life Born in 1947 in Stuttgart, Riethmüller studied musicology, philosophy and modern German literature at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, where he received his doctorate in 1974 from Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht with the dissertation Die Musik als Abbild der Realität, and habilitated in 1984 with his study on Ferruccio Busoni's Poetik. He first took a guest professorship at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign , and held substitute professorships at the universities of Heidelberg, and Frankfurt . Riethmüller held additional teach...
Go to Profile#6118
Markolf Hanefeld
#128330
Overall Influence
1935 - Present (91 years)
#6119
Stephen Colagiuri
#128351
Overall Influence
#6120
James William Larrick
#128369
Overall Influence
#6121
Mary C. Sano
#128376
Overall Influence
#6122
Giorgio Ciprandi
#128381
Overall Influence
#6123
Joav Merrick,
#128383
Overall Influence
#6124
Kenneth L. Brigham
#128387
Overall Influence
#6125
Henry C. Jr. Mcgill
#128389
Overall Influence
#6126
Italo Biaggioni
#128400
Overall Influence
#6127
Daniel Louvard
#94771
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (78 years)
Daniel Louvard is a French scientist with the Department of Cell Biology in the Curie institute, Paris. In 1996 he won the Richard Lounsbery Award jointly with Jacques Pouysségur for "their contributions to the study of the regulation of cell division and differentiation."
Go to Profile#6128
Frederick Rauscher
#95409
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Frederick Rauscher is a philosophy professor and well known Kant scholar currently teaching at Michigan State University. Rauscher earned his Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania in 1993. Previously, he taught at Eastern Illinois University and the University of Pennsylvania. Rauscher currently teaches courses on Kant, early modern philosophy, ethical theory, and German Idealism.
Go to Profile#6129
Roberto C. Heros
#128425
Overall Influence
#6130
Eliezer A. Rachmilewitz
#128436
Overall Influence
#6131
Cyril Desbruslais
#73488
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
Cyril Desbruslais is an Indian Jesuit priest, a playwright and Professor of Philosophy at Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth, Pune, India. Family background and early life Desbruslais was born in Calcutta, Bengal Presidency, British India, on 21 December 1940. He was born to Cyril and Maisie Desbruslais. He has a sister named after his mother. Another sister, Marina, was born two years later but she died of tuberculosis at the age of eighteen months. Desbruslais has stated, "She has always been my little baby intercessor in heaven. Mum and Dad died, also of TB, in the early 1950s . We were brought up b...
Go to Profile#6132
Maurice E. Enriquez-sarano
#128440
Overall Influence
#6133
Eiki Kominami
#128456
Overall Influence
#6134
Anders Odén
#128460
Overall Influence
#6135
Luc Van Kaer
#128462
Overall Influence
#6136
Cyril Wecht
#5611
Overall Influence
1931 - Present (95 years)
Cyril Harrison Wecht is an American forensic pathologist. He has been the president of both the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and the American College of Legal Medicine, and headed the board of trustees of the American Board of Legal Medicine. Wecht served as County Commissioner and Allegheny County Coroner and Medical Examiner, serving the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. He is perhaps best known for his criticism of the Warren Commission's findings concerning the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Go to Profile#6137
Peter M. Suter
#128471
Overall Influence
#6138
Henry J. M. Barnett
#128477
Overall Influence
#6139
Tomoki Naoe
#128483
Overall Influence
#6140
Annette Lemieux
#68784
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
Annette Lemieux is an American artist who emerged in the early 1980s along with the "picture theory" artists . Lemieux brought to the studio a discipline equally based on introspection, and the manifestations of an ideological minimalism. Process is a key component in the execution of her works over the past three decades, creating the lure to the confrontation of issues of social and historical urgency. Lemieux has been the recipient of awards from the National Endowment of the Arts and the Keiser Wilhelm Museum, Germany and an honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts from Monserrat College of Art....
Go to Profile#6141
Phillip Cary
#49734
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Phillip S. Cary is an American philosopher who serves as a professor at Eastern University with a concentration on Augustine of Hippo and the history of the reception of Augustine's thought. Born on June 10, 1958, he received his Doctor of Philosophy degree from Yale University under Nicholas Wolterstorff. He has written a number of books, including three published by Oxford University Press. Additionally, he has provided lectures on the history of Christian theology as well as on major figures in ecclesiastical history for The Teaching Company. Cary is a former Chair of the Augustine and Aug...
Go to Profile#6142
D. M. Burnes Boje
#128535
Overall Influence
#6143
Stanley N. Cohen
#128581
Overall Influence
#6144
Saju Chackalackal
#82034
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
Saju Chackalackal is an Indian author and professor of Philosophy at Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram Bangalore. He is also a Catholic religious priest of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate Congregation. He is a Kantian scholar who obtained a PhD from Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas Rome. He was the former chief editor of the Journal of Dharma. He has authored many books and articles. He was instrumental in preparing a number of course materials for Indira Gandhi National Open University, Delhi.
Go to Profile#6145
Paul L. Gepts
#128607
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
#6146
Cédric Blanpain
#82331
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Cédric Blanpain is a Belgian researcher in the field of stem cells . He is a tenured professor of developmental biology and genetics at Université Libre de Bruxelles and director of the stem cell and cancer lab at its Faculty of Medicine. He was one of the first researchers in the world to use cell lineage tracing in cancer research and he showed for the first time the existence of cancer stem cells in solid tumors in vivo. He was selected by Nature as one of 10 People who mattered most in 2012 and he received the outstanding young investigator award of the International Society for Stem Cell...
Go to Profile#6147
Scott David Ramsey
#128621
Overall Influence
#6148
Robert H. Goetz
#38074
Overall Influence
1910 - 2000 (90 years)
Robert Hans Goetz was the surgeon who performed the first successful clinical coronary artery bypass graft surgery. The surgery was performed May 2, 1960 using the left internal thoracic artery. The graft remained patent, as demonstrated by angiography, and the patient remained free of angina for one year. While names such as Michael Debakey, Christiaan Barnard , and others are well known, Goetz gained little recognition.
Go to Profile#6149
Michael Fredrick Vaezi
#128670
Overall Influence
#6150
Donald A. Goldmann
#128685
Overall Influence
