Search People Result | Academic Influence

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 …

See additional learning tools, study tips, features on campus life and much more at our Student Resources Headquarters.

Search Influential People

Person Name

School

Gender

Country

Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Philosophy,

#3501

Raymond Tallis

#12374

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

Raymond C. Tallis is a philosopher, poet, novelist, cultural critic and a retired medical physician and clinical neuroscientist. Specialising in geriatrics, Tallis served on several UK commissions on medical care of the aged and was an editor or major contributor to two key textbooks in the field, The Clinical Neurology of Old Age and Textbook of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology.

#3502

Rudolf Haym

1821 - 1901 (80 years)

Rudolf Haym was a German philosopher. He was born in Grünberg in Prussia , and died in St. Anton . He studied philosophy and theology at Halle and Berlin. He was a member of the National Assembly at Frankfurt in 1848, and wrote an account of the proceedings from the standpoint of the Right Centre. From 1851 he lectured in literature and philosophy at the University of Halle, and became professor in 1860.

#3503

Peter Lipton

#45617

Overall Influence

1954 - 2007 (53 years)

Peter Lipton was the Hans Rausing Professor and Head of the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University, and a fellow of King's College, until his unexpected death in November 2007. According to his obituary on the Cambridge web site, he was "recognized as one of the leading philosophers of science and epistemologists in the world."

#3504

Joseph Volpe

#56933

Overall Influence

1938 - Present (86 years)

Joseph J. Volpe is an American physician, the Bronson Crothers Professor of Neurology, Emeritus at Harvard Medical School and Neurologist-in-Chief Emeritus at Boston Children's Hospital. He was an early contributor to the field of neonatal neurology and has authored several editions of an influential textbook, Neurology of the Newborn.

#3505

George Pitcher

#37178

Overall Influence

1925 - 2018 (93 years)

George Willard Pitcher was an American philosopher. He was a professor of philosophy at Princeton University from 1956 to 1982. He was an expert on the work of George Berkeley and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

#3506

Lazarus Bendavid

Lazarus Bendavid

1762 - 1832 (70 years)

Lazarus Bendavid was a German mathematician and philosopher known for his exposition of Kantian philosophy. Biography Bendavid was a Jewish Kantian philosopher. After his graduation from the University of Berlin he lectured for some years on the philosophy of Kant in Vienna. His lectures being discouraged by the Austrian government during a general purge of foreigners, Bendavid returned to Berlin, where he found government employment and continued to lecture and write.

#3507

Eugène Dupréel

1879 - 1967 (88 years)

Eugène Dupréel was a Belgian philosopher. He has been professor at the Université libre de Bruxelles from 1907 to 1950, teaching logic, metaphysics, greek philosophy, moral philosophy and sociological theory. He developed an ethical theory and a theory of knowledge deeply influenced by sociology, and worked closely with the Institut de Sociologie Solvay. Leader of the "École de Bruxelles", he had a major influence on the argumentation theorist Chaïm Perelman and thus has been instrumental in the renewal of rhetoric.

#3508

Fernand Labrie

#38147

Overall Influence

1937 - 2019 (82 years)

Fernand Labrie, was a Canadian medical researcher who specializes in endocrinological research and prostate cancer research. Life and career Born in Laurierville, Quebec, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1957 from the Séminaire de Québec. He received his Doctor of Medicine in 1962 and a Ph.D. in 1966 from Université Laval. From 1966 to 1969, he took his postdoctoral studies at the University of Cambridge and the University of Sussex.

#3509

Azar Kayvan

1501 - 1609 (108 years)

Āzar Kayvān was the Zoroastrian high priest of Istakhr and a gnostic philosopher, who was a native of Fars, Iran and later emigrated to Patna in the Mughal Empire during the reign of Emperor Akbar. A member of the community ,

#3510

Jakob Klatzkin

1882 - 1948 (66 years)

Jakob Klatzkin, Yakov/Jakub Klaczkin was a Jewish philosopher, publicist, author, and publisher. Life Klatzkin was born in Byaroza-Kartuskaya, a son of the local Rabbi Eliyahu Klatzkin. He received his early schooling from his father and yeshivas in Lithuania. Later he traveled to Germany to study with philosopher Hermann Cohen. Klatzkin received his doctorate from the University of Berne in Switzerland, then returned to Germany to write for Hebrew periodicals and establish Jewish publishing firms. He also served as director of the Jewish National Fund in Cologne.

#3511

Alain Fischer

#19245

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (75 years)

Alain Fischer is a doctor, professor of pediatric immunology and French researcher in biology. Biography Alain Fischer's father had wanted to become a doctor, but had been prevented from doing so by the numerous clauses established against the Jews of Hungary. Alain Fischer says his father was one of the reasons he has made a medical career choice.

#3512

Frank Haven Hinman

#62212

Overall Influence

#3513

Zeno of Tarsus

250 BC - 200 BC (50 years)

Zeno of Tarsus was a Stoic philosopher and the son of Dioscorides. Biography Zeno was a pupil of Chrysippus, and when Chrysippus died c. 206 BC, he succeeded him to become the fourth scholarch of the Stoic school in Athens.

#3514

Ralph Lerner

#33928

Overall Influence

1928 - Present (96 years)

Ralph Lerner is an American political philosopher. Lerner was born in Chicago, and attended the University of Chicago for his bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in political science. His Ph.D. was advised by Leo Strauss. Lerner later joined the Chicago faculty, where he was named the Benjamin Franklin Professorship until 2003, when he was granted emeritus status.

#3515

Sohan Singh Hayreh

#62273

Overall Influence

#3516

Andrew McMichael

Andrew McMichael

#55835

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (81 years)

Sir Andrew James McMichael, is an immunologist, Professor of Molecular Medicine, and previously Director of the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine at the University of Oxford. He is particularly known for his work on T cell responses to viral infections such as influenza and HIV.

#3517

Brendan Myers

#49957

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (50 years)

Brendan Cathbad Myers is a Canadian philosopher and author known for his contributions in environmental philosophy, Druidry and Neo-Druidism, mythology, and applied virtue ethics. Philosophy and writings Normative in their conception, Myers' works fundamentally examine ideas regarding the interconnectedness of creation and emphasize the importance of strong moral character as vital to the health and well-being of the world and society. Myers criticizes utilitarian views, especially "negative" utilitarianism, which holds that ethics require nothing more than the minimization of harm, and of deontological views, which emphasize social duties and adhering to social norms, i.e.

#3518

Sterling M. McMurrin

Sterling M. McMurrin

#19925

Overall Influence

1914 - 1996 (82 years)

Sterling Moss McMurrin was a liberal Mormon theologian and Philosophy professor at the University of Utah. He served as United States Commissioner of Education in the administration of President John F. Kennedy.

#3519

Avedis Donabedian

#6316

Overall Influence

1919 - 2000 (81 years)

Avedis Donabedian was a physician and founder of the study of quality in health care and medical outcomes research, most famously as a creator of The Donabedian Model of care. Early life Avedis Donabedian was born in Beirut, Lebanon, in an Armenian family from Western Armenia. Although the rest of his parents' families perished from the Armenian genocide, Donabedian's immediate family was able to escape, ultimately migrating to Palestine. His father had qualified as a doctor at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon and soon after set up practice in the small Christian town of Ramallah, near Jerusalem.

#3520

Carl Hilty

1833 - 1909 (76 years)

Carl Andreas Hilty was a Swiss lawyer, professor of constitutional law, politician, philosopher, lay theologian and writer. Life Family background, education and early career Hilty was born in the small town of Werdenberg in the canton of St. Gallen in northeastern Switzerland. His father was the physician Johann Ulrich Hilty, who practised medicine in Chur, the capital of the eastern canton of the Grisons. His family had been based in Werdenberg for centuries and in 1835 he bought the crumbling Werdenberg Castle at an auction. Carl Hilty's mother Elisabeth hailed from Chur and was the daughter of a former regimental doctor of the French Army.

#3521

Tilman Pesch

1836 - 1899 (63 years)

Tilman Pesch , was a German Jesuit philosopher. Life He became a Jesuit on 15 October 1852, and made his novitiate at Friedrichsburg near Münster; he studied classics two years at Paderborn, philosophy two years at Bonn; taught four years at Feldkirch, Austria; studied theology one year at Paderborn and three years at Maria-Laach, after which he made his third year of novitiate at Paderborn. He then taught philosophy at Maria-Laach . From 1870 to 1876 he worked in the ministry, and again taught philosophy eight years , at the Castle of Bleijenbeek in Afferden.

#3522

Josef Simon

#48006

Overall Influence

1930 - 2016 (86 years)

Josef Simon was a contemporary German philosopher and professor of the University of Bonn, born in Hupperath. He wrote extensively on metaphysics, epistemology, the philosophy of German idealism and various philosophers, mainly Kant, Hamann and Nietzsche. Perhaps Simon's most influential work has been in the philosophy of language. His main work, Philosophie des Zeichens, has been influenced by, among others, Kant, Hegel, Peirce and Wittgenstein, Hamann, Humboldt or Nietzsche.

#3523

Anne Sauvagnargues

#38566

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (63 years)

Anne Sauvagnargues is a French philosopher specializing in the work of Gilles Deleuze. Biography A former student of the École Normale Supérieure in Fontenay-aux-Roses, she taught at the École normale supérieure of Lyon and has been professor at the University Paris X since 2010,

#3524

Richard Hanley

#54916

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (67 years)

Richard Hanley is a Zambian-born Australian philosopher. Life Richard Hanley, also known as "Hypertime Hanley" was born in Zambia and later moved to Australia as a small child. He studied at the University of Sydney, and completed his PhD at University of Maryland. He is now an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Delaware. Philosophically, he is a perdurantist following in the footsteps of David Lewis. Hanley believes that time travel is logically, physically, and epistemically possible.

#3525

M. Hiriyanna

1871 - 1950 (79 years)

Mysore Hiriyanna was an eminent Indian philosopher, Sanskrit scholar and authority on Indian aesthetics. He was a Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Mysore and a contemporary of Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. His classes on Indian Philosophy were comprehensive. His classroom dictations, published by Allen & Unwin in book form as "Outlines of Indian Philosophy" brought Hiriyanna international recognition. This was a seminal work on Indian Philosophy. His other prominent works include "Indian Conception of Values", "Essentials of Indian Philosophy", "The Quest after Perfection" and "Art Experience".

#3526

Helen Beebee

#47426

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (56 years)

Helen Beebee is Professor of Philosophy of Science at the University of Leeds and a Fellow of the British Academy. Previously, Beebee was the Samuel Hall Professor of Philosophy at Manchester. Beebee's work has been influential across a wide variety of fields, including causation, free will, and natural kinds. Eric Schliesser, writing on NewApps, described Beebee as 'one of the most prominent metaphysicists of our time'. Beebee has a significant interest in the problem of underrepresentation of women in the field of philosophy, and has spoken about the problems that face women philosophers in...

#3527

William Hirstein

#29866

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (58 years)

William Hirstein is an American philosopher primarily interested in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, metaphysics, cognitive science, and analytic philosophy. He is a professor of philosophy at Elmhurst University.

#3528

Richard Grandy

#29426

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

Richard Grandy is an American philosopher and logician, who is emeritus professor of philosophy at Rice University. Education and career Grandy earned his Ph.D. in philosophy at Princeton University under the direction of Paul Benacerraf. He taught at Princeton University from 1967 to 1974, then at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill before moving to Rice University in 1980, where he spent the rest of his career.

#3529

Simmias of Thebes

500 BC - 400 BC (100 years)

Simmias of Thebes was an ancient Greek philosopher, disciple of Socrates, and a friend of Cebes. In his Memorabilia, Xenophon includes him in the inner circle of Socrates' followers. He appears in Plato's Phaedo as a main discussion partner of Socrates alongside Cebes, as well as Crito, Phaedrus, and Epistle XIII.

#3530

Samuel Freeman

#33143

Overall Influence

Samuel Freeman is an American philosopher, Avalon Professor of the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy and Law at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a leading authority on the philosophy of John Rawls and also writes in political and legal philosophy, from a Rawlsian perspective.

#3531

Robert Stam

#14761

Overall Influence

1941 - Present (83 years)

Robert Stam is an American film theorist working on film semiotics. He is a professor at New York University, where he teaches about the French New Wave filmmakers. Stam has published widely on French literature, comparative literature, and on film topics such as film history and film theory. Together with Ella Shohat, he co-authored Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the Media.

#3532

Margaret Urban Walker

#37652

Overall Influence

1948 - 2017 (69 years)

Margaret Urban Walker is an American philosopher and academic who is the Donald J. Schuenke Chair Emerita in Philosophy at Marquette University. Before her appointment at Marquette, she was the Lincoln Professor of Ethics at Arizona State University, and before that she was at Fordham University. She has also previously held visiting appointments at Washington University in St. Louis, University of South Florida, and Catholic University of Leuven.

#3533

Alexander Tille

Alexander Tille

1866 - 1912 (46 years)

Alexander Tille was a German philosopher. He published the first English translation of Friedrich Nietzsche's Also sprach Zarathustra in 1896. Tille strongly supported eugenics and Social Darwinism. He claimed Christian ethics, democracy, equality, humanism and socialism were only the delusions held by the weak. Tille felt slums were good, since they could help purge society of the "unfit". He also thought disabled and mentally ill people should be left to starve, with food only given to the "fit".

#3534

Henry J. Mankin‡

#3535

Justus Azzopardi

#53367

Overall Influence

Justus Azzopardi was a minor Maltese philosopher. His area of specialisation in philosophy was chiefly metaphysics. No portrait of him is known to exist as yet. Life Little is known of Azzopardi’s personal life. He was a diocesan priest, a professor of philosophy, and an adherent to Aristotelico-Thomistic Scholasticism.

#3536

James Heisig

#19551

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (80 years)

James Wallace Heisig is a philosopher who specialises in the field of philosophy of religion. He has published a number of books on topics ranging from the notion of God in analytical psychology, the Kyoto School of Philosophy to contemporary inter-religious dialogue. His books, translations, and edited collections, which have appeared in 18 languages, currently number 90 volumes.

#3537

Alan Carter

#45551

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Alan Brian Carter is Emeritus Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Glasgow. Life and work Carter earned a BA at the University of Kent at Canterbury, a MA at the University of Sussex and a DPhil at St Cross College at the University of Oxford. Carter's first academic position was Lecturer in Political Theory at University College Dublin. He then became Head of the Philosophy Department at Heythrop College, University of London. Subsequently, he was Professor of Philosophy and Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He has been a Visiting Professor at the University of British Columbia and at the University of Bucharest.

#3538

Joseph A. Bracken

#38359

Overall Influence

1930 - Present (94 years)

Joseph A. Bracken, S.J. is an American philosopher and Catholic theologian. Bracken is a proponent of process philosophy and process theology of Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne. Much of his work is devoted to a synthesis of revealed religion and Christian trinitarian doctrines with a revised process theology. Bracken introduced a field theoretic approach to process metaphysics.

#3539

Gregory L. L. Moneta

#62733

Overall Influence

#3540

Frederick Banting

Frederick Banting

1891 - 1941 (50 years)

Sir Frederick Grant Banting was a Canadian medical scientist, physician, painter, and Nobel laureate noted as the co-discoverer of insulin and its therapeutic potential. In 1923, Banting and John Macleod received the Nobel Prize in Medicine. Banting shared the honours and award money with his colleague, Charles Best. That same year, the government of Canada granted Banting a lifetime annuity to continue his work. To this day, Frederick Banting, who received the Nobel Prize at age 32, remains the youngest Nobel laureate for Physiology/Medicine.

#3541

Ronald de Sousa

#21497

Overall Influence

1940 - Present (84 years)

Ronald Bon de Sousa Pernes is a Swiss-born Canadian philosopher and academic. He is an emeritus professor at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Toronto, which he joined in 1966. Biography De Sousa possesses both UK and Canadian citizenship. Educated in Switzerland and England, he took his B.A. at New College, Oxford University in 1962, and his Ph.D. at Princeton University in 1966. His thesis Categories, Translation, and Linguistic Theory was supervised by Paul Benacerraf.

#3542

Boyan Petkanchin

Boyan Petkanchin

1907 - 1987 (80 years)

Boyan Petkanchin was a prominent Bulgarian mathematician, working in geometry and foundation of mathematics. As a first chairman of the Department of Mathematical Logic at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences he worked to promote and disseminate the knowledge of mathematical logic both in the professional mathematical community in Bulgaria and as popular science.

#3543

Dominik Perler

#31327

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (59 years)

Dominik Perler is a Swiss philosopher. He was born in Freiburg im Üechtland Perler studied philosophy at the University of Fribourg, University of Bern and University of Göttingen. After finishing his PhD thesis at the University of Fribourg in 1991, Perler was a visiting scholar at Cornell University and at UCLA. After he was granted Habilitation in 1995 at the University of Göttingen, he became professor at the University of Basel in 1997. In 2003 Perler took up a professorship in theoretical philosophy at the Humboldt University of Berlin.

#3544

Elia del Medigo

Elia del Medigo

1460 - 1497 (37 years)

Elia del Medigo, also called Elijah Delmedigo or Elias ben Moise del Medigo and sometimes known to his contemporaries as Helias Hebreus Cretensis or in Hebrew Elijah Mi-Qandia . According to Jacob Joshua Ross, "while the non-Jewish students of Delmedigo may have classified him as an “Averroist”, he clearly saw himself as a follower of Maimonides". But, according to other scholars, Delmedigo was clearly a strong follower of Averroes' doctrines, even the more radical ones: unity of intellect, eternity of the world, autonomy of reason from the boundaries of revealed religion.

#3545

David Miller

#27488

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

David Leslie Miller is an English political theorist. He is Professor of Political Theory at the University of Oxford and an Official Fellow of Nuffield College, Oxford. He previously lectured at the University of Lancaster and the University of East Anglia. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Cambridge, and his Bachelor of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from the University of Oxford. Previous works include Social Justice, On Nationality and Citizenship and National Identity. Miller is known for his support of a modest form of liberal nationalism.

#3546

Michel Clouscard

#20193

Overall Influence

1928 - 2009 (81 years)

Michel Clouscard was a French Marxist philosopher and sociologist. An opponent of capitalism, a critic of the evolution of ideas of progress confronted with the liberal mutations of the end of the 20th century, his work is linked to the thought of Rousseau, Hegel and Marx, whose links and unity he shows. He is known to have philosophically shown the collusion between capitalism and the French theory, represented by Lévi-Strauss and Deleuze, constructing his own concept of neo-Kantianism. He developed a philosophical research around the idea of social contract, postulating that "the constituti...

#3547

Adam Muto

#13073

Overall Influence

1980 - Present (44 years)

Adam Muto is an American writer, storyboard artist, animator, and producer known for his work as the executive producer and showrunner of the animated television series Adventure Time. Career Muto was a classmate of Adventure Time creator Pendleton Ward at CalArts. When Ward was first working on the Adventure Time pilot for the Frederator incubator series Random! Cartoons, Muto assisted him by drawing props. Eventually, Muto went on to work on the television series, serving as a storyboard artist. During the show's first season, he was partnered with Elizabeth Ito, but during the show's second and third seasons, he was partnered with Rebecca Sugar.

#3548

James Hall

#46268

Overall Influence

1933 - Present (91 years)

James H. Hall is an American philosopher. He was the James Thomas Professor of Philosophy at the University of Richmond from 1965 until his retirement in 2005. He remains at the university as Professor Emeritus. His philosophical interests include: 20th Century analytic philosophy, epistemology, philosophy of religion, and logical empiricism. He has produced two lecture series for The Teaching Company: Philosophy of Religion and Tools of Thinking: Understanding the World Through Experience and Reason.

#3549

C. A. J. Coady

#25289

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (88 years)

Cecil Anthony John Coady, more commonly publishing as C. A. J. Coady and less formally known as Tony Coady , is a prominent Australian philosopher with an international reputation for his research, particularly in epistemology but also in political and applied philosophy. Coady's best-known work relates to the epistemological problems posed by testimony, most fully expounded in his book Testimony: a Philosophical Study . It was influential in establishing a new branch of inquiry within the field of epistemology. He is also well known for his publications on issues related to political violence.

#3550

Joseph Rizzo

#51545

Overall Influence

Joseph Rizzo was a minor Maltese philosopher and theologian who probably specialised in logic. Life Rizzo was a diocesan priest. He studied theology and was a professor of philosophy. He taught philosophy in Malta at least between 1781 and 1782. No other information is known as yet about his personal life, and no portrait of him seems to have survived.

« Previous Next »

Image Attributions