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).
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List of the most influential people in Philosophy,
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August Wagenmann
1863 - 1955 (92 years)
August Emil Ludwig Wagenmann was a German ophthalmologist. August Wagenmann obtained a degree of medical doctor at the universities of Göttingen and Munich. After graduation, he received a position of assistant doctor in the Eye Clinic at Göttingen University, which was chaired by Theodor Leber. In 1888, August Wagenmann was qualified as a privatdocent in ophthalmology.
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Otto Kahler
1849 - 1893 (44 years)
Otto Kahler was a physician and pathologist born in Prague, Austrian Empire. In 1871 he obtained his medical doctorate in Prague, and following an educational trip to Paris, returned to his hometown as an assistant to Joseph Halla at the internal clinic. In 1882 he became an associate professor at Karl-Ferdinands-Universität, and a few years later , was a "full professor" of pathology and therapy. In 1889 he relocated to the University of Vienna, succeeding Heinrich von Bamberger as professor of special pathology. After a year in Vienna, he developed tongue cancer and his assistant, Friedrich Kraus , subsequently took over his lectures.
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Adolf Abicht
1793 - 1860 (67 years)
Adolf Abicht was a Polish-Lithuanian physician. He was a professor of general pathology, therapy, and medical history at the Vilnius University, and was a president of the Medical Society in Vilnius from 1829–1838.
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Paul von Bruns
1846 - 1916 (70 years)
Paul von Bruns was a German surgeon. He was born in Tübingen, and was the son of surgeon Victor von Bruns. His father-in-law was Protestant theologian Karl Heinrich Weizsäcker. Bruns was born July 2, 1846. In 1882, Bruns became director of the surgical clinic at Tübingen, as well as a full professor at the University. He was the author of works on numerous medical subjects — laryngotomy for removal of growths in the larynx, acute osteomyelitis, gunshot wounds, limb operations and the treatment of goiters, to name a few.
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Stephen Whisson
1710 - 1783 (73 years)
Stephen Whisson was a tutor at Trinity College, Cambridge, United Kingdom, and coached 72 students in the 1744–1754 period. Biography Wisson was from St Neots, Huntingdonshire and was the son of a publican. In 1735, he matriculated from Wakefield School, Yorkshire.
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Ernst, Baron von Feuchtersleben
1806 - 1849 (43 years)
Baron Ernst von Feuchtersleben , was an Austrian physician, poet and philosopher. He was a member of the von Feuchtersleben family Life He was born as a son of Ernst von Feuchtersleben . He was of an old Saxon noble family. His older half-brother was Eduard von Feuchtersleben , son of Ernst von Feuchtersleben from his first marriage.
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Franz Josef Ruprecht
1814 - 1870 (56 years)
Franz Josef Ruprecht was an Austrian-born physician and botanist active in the Russian Empire, where he was known as Frants Ivanovič Ruprekht . He was born in Freiburg im Breisgau, and grew up in Prague, where he studied, and graduated as Doctor of Medicine in 1836. After a short stint in medical practice in Prague, he was appointed curator of the herbarium of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg in 1839, then assistant director of the Saint Petersburg Botanical Garden between 1851 and 1855, and professor of botany in 1855 at the University of Saint Petersburg. He died in Saint...
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Robert Meyer
1864 - 1947 (83 years)
Robert Meyer was a German pathologist. He studied medicine at the universities of Leipzig, Heidelberg and Strassburg, receiving his doctorate at the latter institution in 1889. From 1890 to 1894 he was a medical practitioner in the community of Dedeleben, and afterwards worked as assistant to gynecologist Johann Veit in Berlin.
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John Smith
1721 - 1797 (76 years)
John Smith was a Scottish physician and academic. Smith was born in Maybole, Scotland, where his father, William, was a merchant. He studied at the University of Glasgow beginning in 1736, entered Balliol College, Oxford in 1744 with the support of the Snell Exhibition, and earned a B.A. in 1748 and an M.A. in 1751 from Balliol. He then studied under Nathan Alcock in St Mary Hall, earning his doctorate in 1757. Alcock left Oxford for Bath in the same year, and Smith took his place. At Oxford, he taught anatomy and chemistry. Despite not being a mathematician, he held the Savilian chair of geo...
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Johann Georg Hiltensperger
1806 - 1890 (84 years)
Johann Georg Hiltensperger was a German history painter and a professor at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Biography Born in Haldenwang, Oberallgäu, he was trained in drawing by L. Weiß before studying under Johann Peter von Langer at the Royal Art Academy and under Peter von Cornelius at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. Returning to Munich in 1825, he there received commissions for frescoes and oil paintings from Ludwig I of Bavaria and Maximilian II Joseph of Bavaria. For example, between 1838 and 1865 he produced the Odyssey Cycle in festal hall of the Munich Residenz to designs by Ludwig Schwanthaler.
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