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,
#13051
Marcel M. Verbeek
#163178
Overall Influence
#13052
Sunkara Balaparameswara Rao
#22078
Overall Influence
1928 - 2019 (91 years)
Sunkara Balaparameswara Rao was an Indian neurosurgeon. He is regarded as the 'father of neurosurgery in united Andhra Pradesh'. He started the first Department of Neurosurgery in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh in April 1956. He received the Dr. B. C. Roy award in 1989.
Go to Profile#13053
Arnfried Edler
#104835
Overall Influence
1938 - 2022 (84 years)
Arnfried Edler is a German musicologist and university faculty in Kiel and Hanover. Life Born in Lüdenscheid, Edler studied music, German literary history and philosophy in Saarbrücken and Kiel and also took the A-Examen for Protestant Church Music at the Musikhochschule Köln in 1964. After completing his doctorate in historical musicology in 1968 and his legal clerkship for teaching at grammar schools, he worked from 1969 as a research assistant, head of the student cantor's office and university organist in Kiel with simultaneous teaching duties at the Lübeck Academy of Music.
Go to Profile#13054
Robert Laurence Jilka
#163192
Overall Influence
#13055
Björn L. Rydevik
#163194
Overall Influence
#13056
Walter W. Benjamin
#163207
Overall Influence
#13057
Joseph Marie, baron de Gérando
1772 - 1842 (70 years)
Joseph Marie, baron de Gérando, born Joseph Marie Degérando , was a French jurist, philanthropist and philosopher of Italian descent. He is most remembered for his 1804 book Histoire comparée des systèmes de philosophie, considérés relativement aux principes des connaissances humaines as well as his 1820 study of benevolent activity, Le visiteur du pauvre . He influenced Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, and especially Ralph Waldo Emerson who used his philosophical framework extensively in support of his own first book Nature.
Go to Profile#13058
Jun‐ichi Kuratsu
#163212
Overall Influence
#13059
Emile Letournel
#163214
Overall Influence
#13060
Edward B. Diethrich
#163220
Overall Influence
#13061
Richard Mortensen
#44256
Overall Influence
1910 - 1993 (83 years)
Richard Mortensen was a Danish painter. Biography Richard Strange Mortensen was born in Copenhagen, Denmark. He studied between 1931 and 1932 at the Royal Danish Academy of Art in Copenhagen. Influenced by the works of Wassily Kandinsky, he developed an abstract art style. In Copenhagen, Mortensen was joint founder of the "Linien" school of abstract painters.
Go to Profile#13062
George W. Paulson
#163252
Overall Influence
#13063
Nicholas Gerard Smedira
#163254
Overall Influence
#13064
Markus Antonius Kuczyk
#163265
Overall Influence
#13065
Terence Bennett
#163270
Overall Influence
#13066
Maír José Benardete
1895 - 1989 (94 years)
Maír José Benardete was a scholar of Sephardic studies and was a long-time Professor of Spanish and Sephardic Studies at Brooklyn College. He was a past Director of The Hispanic Institute at Columbia University's Sephardic Studies Section in the late 1920s. The Institute was also known as Casa Hispánica.
Go to Profile#13067
Teruhiko Wakayama
#163290
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (59 years)
#13068
John Fuller
#25640
Overall Influence
1937 - Present (89 years)
John Fuller FRSL is an English poet and author, and Fellow Emeritus at Magdalen College, Oxford. Biography Fuller was born at Ashford, Kent, United Kingdom, the son of poet and Oxford Professor Roy Fuller, and educated at St Paul's School and New College, Oxford.
Go to Profile#13069
Dick Oepkes
#163307
Overall Influence
#13070
Joachim Prof Dr Heyder
#163314
Overall Influence
#13071
Peter Vedsted
#163332
Overall Influence
#13072
Jay Ross Kaplan
#163338
Overall Influence
#13073
Carlo Maratta
1625 - 1713 (88 years)
Carlo Maratta or Maratti was an Italian painter, active mostly in Rome, and known principally for his classicizing paintings executed in a Late Baroque Classical manner. Although he is part of the classical tradition stemming from Raphael, he was not exempt from the influence of Baroque painting and particularly in his use of colour. His contemporary and friend, Giovanni Bellori, wrote an early biography on Maratta.
Go to Profile#13074
Graham G.c.m. Watt
#163340
Overall Influence
#13075
Peter M. Mauch
#163344
Overall Influence
#13076
Guerino Mazzola
#83227
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Guerino Bruno Mazzola is a Swiss mathematician, musicologist, and jazz pianist, as well as a writer. Education and career Mazzola obtained his PhD in mathematics at University of Zürich in 1971 under the supervision of Herbert Groß and Bartel Leendert van der Waerden. In 1980, he habilitated in Algebraic Geometry and Representation Theory. In 2000, he was awarded the medal of the Mexican Mathematical Society. In 2003, he habilitated in Computational Science at the University of Zürich.
Go to Profile#13077
Giovanni Staurenghi
#163377
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
#13078
Robert Merriam Rogers
#163384
Overall Influence
#13079
Remo Naccarato
#163392
Overall Influence
#13080
Robert F. Sturrock
#163394
Overall Influence
#13081
Ernst Simon
1899 - 1988 (89 years)
Ernst Akiba/Akiva Simon was a German-Jewish educator and religious philosopher. Biography In the 1920s, Ernst Simon co-founded Brit Shalom along with Martin Buber, an organization espousing a binational solution for promoting the co-existence of Jews and Arabss in the State of Israel. From 1930 to 1933 he taught at the Hebrew Reali School Haifa, headed by Arthur Biram. In 1942, he was one of the founders of the binationalist Ihud party.
Go to Profile#13082
H. Grant Prentice
#163410
Overall Influence
#13083
Abraham Yagel
1553 - 1623 (70 years)
Abraham Yagel was an Italian Jewish catechist, philosopher, and cabalist. He lived successively at Luzzara, Venice, Ferrara, and Sassuolo. Life and identity Giulio Bartolocci, followed by De Rossi, Wolf, and Julius Fürst, erroneously identified Abraham Yagel with the Christian censor Camillo Jagel, declaring that Abraham Jagel embraced Christianity and changed his name to "Camillo Jagel." The untenability of this identification has been proved by later scholars, including Hananiah Coèn.
Go to Profile#13084
Patricio López‐jaramillo
#163418
Overall Influence
#13085
Robert G. Lahita
#57388
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Robert George Lahita is an American physician, internist and rheumatologist, best known for his research into systemic lupus erythematosus. and other autoimmune diseases. He is the author of more than 16 books and 150 scientific publications in the field of autoimmunity and immuno-endocrinology and a media consultant on health-related issues. He currently serves as Director of the Institute of Autoimmune and Rheumatic Diseases at St. Joseph's Healthcare System, specializing in autoimmunity, rheumatology, and treatment of diseases of joints, muscle, bones and tendons including arthritis, ba...
Go to Profile#13086
Richard A. Lange
#163430
Overall Influence
#13087
Leon w. Hoyer
#163451
Overall Influence
#13088
Stuart L. Silverman
#163462
Overall Influence
#13089
John A. Musick
#163464
Overall Influence
#13090
Charles George Herbermann
1840 - 1916 (76 years)
Charles George Herbermann was a German-American professor and historian. Biography Charles George Herbermann was born in Saerbeck near Münster, Westphalia, Prussia on 8 December 1840, the son of George Herbermann and Elizabeth Stipp. He arrived in the United States in 1851, and seven years later graduated at College of St. Francis Xavier, New York City. He was appointed professor of Latin language and Literature and librarian at the College of the City of New York. For more than 50 years, he was immersed amidst various issues involved with Catholicism. He was president of the Catholic Club and of the United States Catholic Historical Society .
Go to Profile#13091
Nilratan Sircar
1861 - 1943 (82 years)
Sir Nilratan Sircar M.A. M.D. D.Sc. was an Indian medical doctor, educationist, philanthropist and swadeshi entrepreneur. He was awarded honorary DCL by University of Oxford & LL.D by University of Edinburgh. He was a renowned figure in promoting Science and Technology education in contemporary India.
Go to Profile#13092
Howard M. Shulman
#163497
Overall Influence
#13093
Thomas M. Bashore
#163500
Overall Influence
#13094
Vincenzo G. Mirone
#163501
Overall Influence
#13095
John Anthony Thompson
#163510
Overall Influence
#13096
Rodger C. Haggitt
#163513
Overall Influence
#13097
Franco Bertoni
#163518
Overall Influence
#13098
Steen Elkjaer Husted
#163521
Overall Influence
#13099
Stanley Eveling
#87712
Overall Influence
1925 - 2008 (83 years)
Stanley Eveling, or Harry Stanley Eveling was an English playwright and academic, based in Scotland. Life Eveling was educated at Rutherford College and Samuel King's School. After serving as an officer with the Durham Light Infantry in the Far East at the end of the Second World War, he attended King's College, Durham University, where he was editor of King's Courier, the student newspaper. He then completed a postgraduate degree in philosophy at Oxford University. Eveling taught at the University of Aberdeen and the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, before becoming a senior lecturer...
Go to Profile#13100
Toshihiro Nukiwa
#163560
Overall Influence
