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,
#12901
Nuno Lunet
#161795
Overall Influence
#12902
Andrew P. Goldberg
#161809
Overall Influence
#12903
Neil A. Kurtzman
#161811
Overall Influence
#12904
Lon R. White,
#161814
Overall Influence
#12905
Stuart J. Shankland
#161816
Overall Influence
#12906
Tristan Dongbo Yan
#161828
Overall Influence
#12907
Donald Everett Schmechel
#161846
Overall Influence
#12908
Sergio Luigi Chierchia
#161852
Overall Influence
#12909
Elizabeth Eva Leach
#65965
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (55 years)
Elizabeth Eva Leach is a British musicologist and music theorist who specializes in medieval music, especially that of the fourteenth century. Much of her scholarship concerns the life and work of Guillaume de Machaut.
Go to Profile#12910
Frederick W. Cheney
#161889
Overall Influence
#12911
James Lorrain Smith
1862 - 1931 (69 years)
James Lorrain Smith FRS FRSE FRCPE was a Scottish pathologist known for his works in human physiology, especially his research on respiration in collaboration with John Scott Haldane. Life He was born in the manse at Half Morton in rural Dumfriesshire the fourth son of Rev Walter Smith who was a Free Church of Scotland minister in the parish. He had several talented siblings, including the mycologist, Annie Lorrain Smith who worked informally at the British Museum. His brother Walter Smith became a professor of philosophy at Lake Forest College in Illinois whilst another brother, William Geor...
Go to Profile#12912
Tobias Pischon
#161906
Overall Influence
#12913
John Dwyer
#68703
Overall Influence
1939 - Present (87 years)
John Michael Dwyer, is an Australian doctor, professor of medicine, and public health advocate. He was originally a Professor of Medicine and Paediatrics, then Head of the Department of Clinical Immunology at Yale University. Returning to Australia, he became Head of the Department of Medicine and the Clinical Dean at the University of New South Wales and Director of Medicine at Sydney's Prince of Wales Hospital, the University's major teaching hospital, for over twenty years. In retirement he is an Emeritus Professor of Medicine of the University. He founded the Australian Health Care Reform Alliance, and was the founding president of the Friends of Science in Medicine until 2019.
Go to Profile#12914
Najm al-Din Kubra
1145 - 1221 (76 years)
Najm ad-Din Kubra was a 13th-century Khwarezmian Sufi from Khwarezm and the founder of the Kubrawiya, influential in the Ilkhanate and Timurid dynasty. His method, exemplary of a "golden age" of Sufi metaphysics, was related to the Illuminationism of Shahab al-Din Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardi as well as to Rumi's Shams Tabrizi. Kubra was born in 540/1145 and died in 618/1221.
Go to Profile#12915
Pavlos K. Toutouzas
#161927
Overall Influence
#12916
O. H. Howard Frazier
#161930
Overall Influence
#12917
Charles Lenwood Nelson
#161931
Overall Influence
#12918
Mark D. Jordan
#96393
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Mark D. Jordan is a scholar of Christian theology, European philosophy, and gender studies. He is currently the Richard Reinhold Niebuhr Research Professor of Divinity at Harvard Divinity School and Professor of the Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality in the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
Go to Profile#12919
Karl E. Hammermeister
#162009
Overall Influence
#12920
Peter A. Angeles
#115300
Overall Influence
1931 - 2004 (73 years)
Peter Adam Angeles was an American philosopher and atheist writer. Angeles was born in Ambridge, Pennsylvania. He obtained his BA, MS and PhD from Columbia University. He taught philosophy at the University of Western Ontario for 14 years. He taught philosophy at University of California, Santa Barbara on a Canada Council Fellowship. He moved to Santa Barbara in 1970. He was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Santa Barbara City College .
Go to Profile#12921
Antoine O. Andremont
#162015
Overall Influence
#12922
Gary W Small
#162016
Overall Influence
#12923
Clement Mundle
1916 - 1989 (73 years)
Clement Williams Kennedy Mundle was a Scottish philosopher and parapsychologist. He was head of the Philosophy Department, University of St. Andrews, University College Dundee later "Queens College" and eventually becoming the University of Dundee, Scotland . From 1955 to 1981 he was Professor of philosophy at the University College of North Wales, Bangor. Mundle was president of the Society for Psychical Research, London .
Go to Profile#12924
Naomi Eilan
#93345
Overall Influence
Naomi Eilan is a British philosopher and professor of philosophy at the University of Warwick, whose works concern consciousness, philosophy of mind, metaphysics and philosophy of psychology. Eilan completed her doctorate at the University of Oxford in 1988, with the dissertation Self-consciousness and experience. She was president of the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology for 2010 to 2014.
Go to Profile#12925
Guy Prof Dr Dr Dirheimer
#162042
Overall Influence
#12926
Severino Elias Ngoenha
#119128
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Severino Elias Ngoenha is a Mozambican philosopher working in the area of Political philosophy. He is one of the main Portuguese-speaking African philosophers, along with other thinkers such as the Mozambican philosopher José Castiano, the Mozambican social theorist Elísio Macamo and the Angolan philosopher Filipe Cahungo.
Go to Profile#12927
Jakob Martini
1570 - 1649 (79 years)
Jakob Martini was a German Lutheran theologian and philosopher. Biography Jakob Martini was born at Langenstein in the hill country to the west of Magdeburg. Adam Martini, his father, was a pastor.
Go to Profile#12928
Thomas Dewar Weldon
1896 - 1958 (62 years)
Thomas Dewar "Harry" Weldon was a British philosopher. Life Thomas Weldon was born at 3 Bryanston Mansions, York Street, Marylebone, London, in 1896. After an education at Tonbridge School, he won a scholarship to read Literae humaniores at Magdalen College, Oxford, which he postponed to become an officer in the Royal Field Artillery in 1915. He spent World War I in France and Belgium, rising to acting captain, being wounded and winning the Military Cross and bar. He finally went up to Oxford in 1919, graduating with a first class degree in 1921. Weldon was elected a fellow and philosophy tutor at his college two years later, getting to know C.
Go to Profile#12929
Eric A. Rose
#162069
Overall Influence
#12930
Jeanne A. Teresi
#162080
Overall Influence
#12931
Robert J. Bache
#162086
Overall Influence
#12932
Raman Gokal
#162087
Overall Influence
#12933
Takeuchi Seihō
1864 - 1942 (78 years)
Takeuchi Seihō was a Japanese painter of the Nihonga genre, active from the Meiji through the early Shōwa period. One of the founders of nihonga, his works spanned half a century and he was regarded as master of the prewar Kyoto circle of painters. His real name was Takeuchi Tsunekichi.
Go to Profile#12934
Francis A. Fitzpatrick
#162108
Overall Influence
#12935
J. David Bristow
#162127
Overall Influence
#12936
Erich Minar
#162128
Overall Influence
#12937
Paul G. Horgan
#162137
Overall Influence
#12938
Daniel Leech-Wilkinson
#96343
Overall Influence
Daniel Leech-Wilkinson is a musicologist, who is Emeritus Professor of Music at King's College London. He studied composition, harpsichord and the organ at the Royal College of Music, and then completed an M.Mus at King's College London specialising in 15th-century music. He received his PhD from the University of Cambridge, on the topic of 14th century compositional processes.
Go to Profile#12939
Philip B. Mcglave
#162155
Overall Influence
#12940
Danny Rischin
#162156
Overall Influence
#12941
Robert I. White
#162168
Overall Influence
#12942
Stanley C. Deresinski
#162180
Overall Influence
#12943
Laurie Glimcher
#24884
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (75 years)
Laurie Hollis Glimcher is an American physician-scientist who was appointed president and CEO of Dana–Farber Cancer Institute in October 2016. She was elected a Member of the American Philosophical Society in 2019.
Go to Profile#12944
Richard L. P. Custer
#162200
Overall Influence
#12945
Arthur S. Kling
#162208
Overall Influence
#12946
Paul Krannhals
1883 - 1934 (51 years)
Paul Krannhals was a Baltic-German philosopher. He was an early supporter of the NSDAP in the 1920s and 1930s. His work Das Organische Weltbild was referred to by Otto Dietrich as "the first attempt from a National Socialist perspective...to scientifically clarify and present the organic or universalist worldview".
Go to Profile#12947
Jean‐marie Desmonts
#162244
Overall Influence
#12948
Norio Matsuki
#162247
Overall Influence
#12949
Edward M. Wojtys
#162249
Overall Influence
#12950
Vallerie V. Mclaughlin
#162250
Overall Influence
