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,
#13301
James Enlou Tcheng
#165258
Overall Influence
#13302
Ulrich Heininger
#165272
Overall Influence
#13303
Michele De Bonis
#165276
Overall Influence
#13304
Sandro Ghisla
#165297
Overall Influence
#13305
Guy Besse
#126089
Overall Influence
1919 - 2004 (85 years)
Guy Besse was a French philosopher and politician, a member of the executive of the French Communist Party . Biography A member of the Responsible du Front National while a student in Lyon under the pseudonym of César, he was part of the Mouvement Jeunes Communistes de France during the Resistance, and was the national secretary of the Union of Communist Students from 1944 to 1945.
Go to Profile#13306
Bruce H. Jones
#165316
Overall Influence
#13307
Mathuram Santosham
#165317
Overall Influence
#13308
Katsutoshi Yoshizato
#165324
Overall Influence
#13309
William A. Pettinger
#165331
Overall Influence
#13310
Thomas W. Klein
#165337
Overall Influence
#13311
Dave Kehr
#48960
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
David Kehr is an American museum curator and film critic. For many years a critic at the Chicago Reader and the Chicago Tribune, he later wrote a weekly column for The New York Times on DVD releases. He later became a curator within the department of film at the Museum of Modern Art.
Go to Profile#13312
Gera Ld Antoch
#165355
Overall Influence
#13313
Jacob Ungerer
1840 - 1920 (80 years)
Jacob Ungerer was a German sculptor and Professor of Fine Arts. Life Jacob Ungerer was born and died in Munich. On his father's side he descended from a family of Munich Cafetiers and brewery owners who had grown rich in the 19th century and who had become technical pioneers . Jacob Ungerer's mother came from a glass blower family from Zwiesel.
Go to Profile#13314
Robert S. Weinstein
#165390
Overall Influence
#13315
Marian Zdziechowski
1861 - 1938 (77 years)
Marian Zdziechowski was a Polish philosopher, Slavist, publicist and cultural historian. He was a critic of fascist and communist totalitarianism, and was considered a representative of catastrophism and philosophical pessimism. He was a brother of the writer Kazimierz Zdziechowski.
Go to Profile#13316
Douglas C. Burton
#165417
Overall Influence
#13317
Lars Gustafsson
#165433
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
#13318
James C. Sisson
#165434
Overall Influence
#13319
J. Donald Hill
#13320
Carl E. Taylor
#38202
Overall Influence
1916 - 2010 (94 years)
Carl Ernest Taylor, MD, DrPH founder of the academic discipline of international health who dedicated his life to the well-being of the world's marginalized people. He was the founding chair of the Department of International Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He was a key contributor to the Alma Ata Declaration. At the age of 88, this energetic man assumed the challenging position as Country Director for the nonprofit organization Future Generations Afghanistan where he led innovative field-based activities until age 90. He has worked in over 70 countries and have students from more than 100 countries.
Go to Profile#13321
John Yu
#52896
Overall Influence
1934 - Present (92 years)
John Samuel Yu is a Chinese-born Australian paediatrics doctor who served as CEO of the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children from 1979 until 1997. He was the Australian of the Year for 1996. Early life and education Born in Nanking , China, he attended Fort Street High School and the University of Sydney in Sydney, Australia. John Yu discovered his passion for paediatric care and after starting work at the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children in 1961 now called the New Children's Hospital, he eventually rose to become Head of Medicine in the hospital and later Chief Executive in 1979.
Go to Profile#13322
Yu Ming Hu
#165462
Overall Influence
#13323
Richard A. W. Sherman
#165464
Overall Influence
#13324
Zinovia Dushkova
#54402
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Zinovia Vasilievna Dushkova is a Russian author, poet, philosopher, and historian. Dushkova has written approximately 60 books which have been published in both Russia and Ukraine and translated into seven languages. Dushkova's philosophy is influenced by Blavatsky's Theosophy.
Go to Profile#13325
Erich Saling
#53572
Overall Influence
1925 - 2021 (96 years)
Erich Saling was a pioneering German gynaecologist and midwifery professional. Many sources identify him as "the father of perinatal medicine": one even identifies him as the originator of the term "perinatal medicine". He was involved in a number of "firsts", among which the most frequently cited occurred in 1960 when he used blood gas analyses to assess the effectiveness of resuscitation procedures in respect of new-born infants. In 1961 Saling teamed up with K. Damaschke to develop a high-speed approach to testing for perinatal blood-oxygen levels and foetal blood analysis.
Go to Profile#13326
Gerrit Smith
1797 - 1874 (77 years)
Gerrit Smith , also spelled Gerritt Smith, was an American social reformer, abolitionist, businessman, public intellectual, and philanthropist. Married to Ann Carroll Fitzhugh, Smith was a candidate for President of the United States in 1848, 1856, and 1860, but only served a single term in the House of Representatives from 1853 to 1854.
Go to Profile#13327
Thomas D. Schiano
#165528
Overall Influence
#13328
Richard O. Cummins
#165530
Overall Influence
#13329
Prof. Pascal Nicod
#165536
Overall Influence
#13330
Douglas Hamilton Smith
#165547
Overall Influence
#13331
Andrew N. Kingsnorth
#165550
Overall Influence
#13332
Manuel Dujovny
#165559
Overall Influence
#13333
Jacques F. Acar
#65093
Overall Influence
1931 - 2020 (89 years)
Jacques Fouad Acar was a French doctor and microbiologist who specialized in antibiotics. Biography Acar left Senegal in 1948 for his studies at the Faculté de médecine de Paris. He graduated in 1954 and completed his military service as a field doctor in sub-Saharan Africa. He was appointed head of the clinic for infectious diseases at the Bichat–Claude Bernard Hospital in Paris in 1962.
Go to Profile#13334
Lynn R. Fraser
#165573
Overall Influence
#13335
Patrick Jean Cozzone
#165580
Overall Influence
#13336
Mark Schroeder
#152593
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (49 years)
Mark Schroeder is an American philosopher whose scholarship focuses on metaethics, particularly expressivism and other forms of noncognitivism. He is a professor of philosophy at the University of Southern California.
Go to Profile#13337
Bruce A. Sullenger
#126232
Overall Influence
Bruce Alan Sullenger is the Joseph W. and Dorothy W. Beard Professor of Experimental Surgery at the Duke University School of Medicine, the Founding Director of the Duke Translational Research Institute which he led from 2006-2016, and the Associate Director for Translation in the Duke Cancer Institute .
Go to Profile#13338
Sydney Segal
#93151
Overall Influence
1920 - 1997 (77 years)
Sydney Segal, was a Canadian pediatrician and neonatologist. He was "actively involved in the areas of medical ethics, fetal medicine, drug-addicted newborns, respiratory pediatrics, children with AIDS and sudden infant death syndrome".
Go to Profile#13339
Lodovico delle Colombe
1565 - 1616 (51 years)
Lodovico delle Colombe was an Italian Aristotelian scholar, famous for his battles with Galileo Galilei in a series of controversies in physics and astronomy. Early life Delle Colombe was born in Florence in the second half of the 16th century. A date of January 20, 1565 has been suggested, but the source for this is unknown. Likewise nothing is known of his family, except that he was of noble origin, or of his education. He became a member of the Accademia Fiorentina when Francesco Nori was its consul and was also a member of the Consiglio dei Dugento, the advisory body to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.
Go to Profile#13340
David L. Dunn
#165604
Overall Influence
#13341
Hans Einar Krokan
#122303
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Hans Einar Krokan is a Norwegian physician and cancer researcher. He was born in Folldal. He graduated as dr.med. in 1977, and was appointed professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology from 1993. His research focused on DNA repair.
Go to Profile#13342
Margaret J. Osler
#115863
Overall Influence
1942 - 2010 (68 years)
Margaret J. "Maggie" Osler was a historian and philosopher of early modern science and a professor of history at the University of Calgary. Biography Osler received a B.A. in philosophy from Swarthmore College in 1963, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Indiana University in History and Philosophy of Science under the supervision of Richard S. Westfall. The title of her dissertation was John Locke and Some Philosophical Problems in the Science of Boyle and Newton. She held teaching appointments at Oregon State University, Harvey Mudd College, and Wake Forest University before coming to the University of Calgary in 1975.
Go to Profile#13343
Donald G. Vidt
#165616
Overall Influence
#13344
Jean‐pierre Devogelaer
#165633
Overall Influence
#13345
Jean Claude Mbanya
#148047
Overall Influence
Jean Claude Mbanya is a Cameroonian professor of medicine and endocrinology. He is the Dean Doctoral School of Life, Health and Environmental Sciences at the University of Yaoundé 1. He is a fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, the World Academy of Sciences and the Royal College of Physicians. He was a former President and currently the honorary leader of the International Diabetes Federation .
Go to Profile#13346
Laura Punnett
#165675
Overall Influence
#13347
Gilbert Deray
#165683
Overall Influence
#13348
Thomas J. Balkany
#53121
Overall Influence
Thomas J. Balkany, M.D. is an American ear surgeon, otolaryngologist and neurotologist specializing in cochlear implantation. He is the Hotchkiss Endowment Distinguished Professor and Chairman Emeritus in the Department of Otolaryngology and Professor of Neurological Surgery and Pediatrics at the University of Miami's Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine. Additionally, he is a fellow of the American Academy of Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery, the American College of Surgeons and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Go to Profile#13349
Bernard J. Cummings
#165726
Overall Influence
#13350
J. A. Papaconstantinou
#165737
Overall Influence
