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
#22501
Francisco Solano López
#22512
Overall Influence
1928 - 2011 (83 years)
Francisco Solano López was an Argentine comics artist. He was the co-creator of El Eternauta. Career Born in Buenos Aires, Solano López began his career in 1953 working for the publishing house Columba where he illustrated the series Perico y Guillerma. Working for Editorial Abril he met Héctor Germán Oesterheld, assigned to illustrate his series Bull Rocket for the magazine Misterix. They collaborated on the series Pablo Maran and Uma-Uma, before joining to start Oesterheld's publishing house Editorial Frontera. For the Frontera's first publication of the monthly Hora Cero, the team produced the series Rolo el marciano adoptivo and El Héroe.
Go to Profile#22502
Seth Clabough
#22513
Overall Influence
Seth Clabough is an American fiction writer and author of the novel All Things Await, which was nominated for the 2017 Library of Virginia Literary Award for Fiction. Clabough's work has been published in anthologies, journals, and magazines ranging from Blackbird: an online journal of literature & the arts and Aesthetica magazine to The Chronicle of Higher Education and New Writing: the International Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing. He has literary representation through Inkwell Management in New York and currently works at Randolph–Macon College as an English profess...
Go to Profile#22503
J. David Velleman
#22514
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
J. David Velleman is an American philosopher. He is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy and Bioethics at New York University and Miller Research Professor of Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University. He primarily works in the areas of ethics, moral psychology, and related areas such as the philosophy of action, and practical reasoning.
Go to Profile#22504
Alexander Soifer
#22515
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (78 years)
Alexander Soifer is a Russian-born American mathematician and mathematics author. His works include over 400 articles and 13 books. Soifer obtained his Ph.D. in 1973 and has been a professor of mathematics at the University of Colorado since 1979. He was visiting fellow at Princeton University from 2002 to 2004, and again in 2006–2007. Soifer also teaches courses on art history and European cinema. His publications include 13 books and over 400 articles.
Go to Profile#22505
Catharine Bond Hill
#22516
Overall Influence
Catharine "Cappy" Bond Hill is the former president of Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, NY. She began in 2006, after former president Frances D. Fergusson retired. Before coming to Vassar, Hill was provost at Williams College. In September 2016 she became managing director of Ithaka S+R.
Go to Profile#22506
Julie Walters
#22517
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Dame Julia Mary Walters , known professionally as Julie Walters, is an English actress. She is the recipient of four British Academy Television Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, two International Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and a Laurence Olivier Award.
Go to Profile#22507
Sophie Oluwole
#22518
Overall Influence
1935 - 2018 (83 years)
Sophie Bosede Oluwole was a Nigerian professor and philosopher, and was the first doctorate degree holder in philosophy in Nigeria. She was a practitioner of Yoruba philosophy, a way of thinking which stems from the ethnic group based in Nigeria. She was vocal about the role of women in philosophy, and the underrepresentation of African thinkers in education.
Go to Profile#22508
Marcel Carné
#22519
Overall Influence
1906 - 1996 (90 years)
Marcel Albert Carné was a French film director. A key figure in the poetic realism movement, Carné's best known films include Port of Shadows , Le Jour Se Lève , The Devil's Envoys and Children of Paradise ; the latter has been cited as one of the great films of all time.
Go to Profile#22509
Philip Ingham
#22520
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Philip William Ingham FRS, FMedSci, Hon. FRCP is a British geneticist, currently the Toh Kian Chui Distinguished Professor at the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, a partnership between Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and Imperial College, London. Previously, he was the inaugural Director of the Living Systems Institute at the University of Exeter, UK and prior to that was Vice Dean, Research at the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine.
Go to Profile#22510
Michael F. Holick
#22521
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Michael F. Holick is an American adult endocrinologist, specializing in vitamin D, such as the identification of both calcidiol, the major circulating form of vitamin D, and calcitriol, the active form of vitamin D. His work has been the basis for diagnostic tests and therapies for vitamin D-related diseases. He is a professor of medicine at the Boston University Medical Center and editor-in-chief of the journal Clinical Laboratory.
Go to Profile#22511
Anne Norton
#22522
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Anne Norton is an American professor of political science and comparative literature. She is also known for her controversial anti-Semitic views. Early life As a child, Norton lived and traveled throughout the world with her family because her father was an officer in the U.S. Navy.
Go to Profile#22512
Wesley Wildman
#22523
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Wesley J. Wildman is a contemporary Australian-American philosopher, theologian, and ethicist. Currently, he is a full professor at the Boston University School of Theology, founding member of the faculty of Computing and Data Sciences, and convener of the Religion and Science doctoral program in Boston University's Graduate School. He is executive director of The Center for Mind and Culture, founding co-director of the Institute for the Biocultural Study of Religion, and founding co-editor of the journal Religion, Brain & Behavior . Wildman's academic work has focused on interpreting religio...
Go to Profile#22513
Peter F. Langman
#22524
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Peter Fabbri Langman is an American counseling psychologist and author. He is a known expert on school shooters. Professional career Langman received his B.A. in psychology from Clark University, his M.A. in counseling psychology from Lesley College, and his Ph.D. in counseling psychology from Lehigh University.
Go to Profile#22514
Royal Skousen
#22525
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Royal Jon Skousen is an American linguist and retired professor of linguistics and English at Brigham Young University , where he is editor of the Book of Mormon Critical Text Project. He is "the leading expert on the textual history of the Book of Mormon" and the founder of the analogical modeling approach to language modeling.
Go to Profile#22515
Serzh Sargsyan
#22526
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Serzh Azati Sargsyan is an Armenian politician who served as the third President of Armenia from 2008 to 2018, and twice as the Prime Minister of Armenia from 2007 to 2008 and again from 17 to 23 April 2018, when he was forced to resign in the 2018 Armenian revolution.
Go to Profile#22516
Monique Canto-Sperber
#22527
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Monique Canto-Sperber is a French philosopher. Her works, translated in several languages, are focused on ethics and contemporary political issues. A former Director of the École normale supérieure from 2005 to 2012, she has been President of Paris Sciences et Lettres – Quartier latin, a French higher education and research institution, since 2012.
Go to Profile#22517
Pentti Kouri
#22528
Overall Influence
1949 - 2009 (60 years)
Pentti Juha Kalervo Kouri was a Finnish economist and venture capitalist. He was born in Kemijärvi. Education and career Kouri was the first Finn to get a scholarship to the United World College of the Atlantic. After graduating from there, he got his master's degree in economics from the University of Helsinki in 1970. In that same year, when he was 21 years old, he was hired by the International Monetary Fund. It was at IMF's research organization where Kouri first met Michael G. Porter, an Australian economist, with whom he later developed the Kouri-Porter model.
Go to Profile#22518
George Sumner Bridges
#22529
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
George Sumner Bridges is an American sociologist and academic administrator who served as the president of The Evergreen State College from October 2015 through June 2021. Early life and education A native of Seattle, Washington, Bridges earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Washington, followed by a Master of Arts in criminology and PhD in sociology from the University of Pennsylvania.
Go to Profile#22519
Foster Hirsch
#22530
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (83 years)
Foster Hirsch is the author of 16 books on subjects related to theatre and film. A native of California, Hirsch received his B.A. from Stanford University and holds M.F.A, M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University. Hirsch joined the English department of Brooklyn College in 1967, and in 1973 became one of the first professors to join the school's newly established film department. He has also been associated with the Pine Bluff Film Festival since its inception in 1994.
Go to Profile#22520
Eddie Izzard
#22531
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Eddie Izzard , also known as Suzy Izzard, is a British stand-up comedian, actor, and activist. Her comedic style takes the form of what appears to the audience as rambling whimsical monologues and self-referential pantomime.
Go to Profile#22521
Melvin A. Eisenberg
#22532
Overall Influence
1934 - Present (92 years)
Melvin A. Eisenberg is the Jesse H. Choper Professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley. After studying at Columbia University and Harvard University , he worked in the firm Kaye Scholer Fierman Hays & Handler, as assistant counsel in the Warren Commission, and joined Berkeley in 1966. He is recognised as a leading scholar in US corporate law, and contract law, in both of which he has authored leading textbooks.
Go to Profile#22522
Jalen Rose
#22533
Overall Influence
1973 - Present (53 years)
Jalen Anthony Rose is an American sports analyst and former professional basketball player. In college, he was a member of the University of Michigan Wolverines' "Fab Five" that reached the 1992 and 1993 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship games as both freshmen and sophomores.
Go to Profile#22523
Trey Songz
#22534
Overall Influence
1984 - Present (42 years)
Tremaine Aldon Neverson , known professionally as Trey Songz, is an American R&B singer and actor. Upon being discovered by record producer Troy Taylor, he signed to Atlantic Records in 2005 and released his debut studio album, I Gotta Make It in July of that year. His follow-up album, Trey Day , spawned his first top 20 single, "Can't Help but Wait". Neverson released his third album, Ready, in 2009 and a single from the album, "Say Aah" , peaked at number nine on the Billboard Hot 100. Ready was nominated for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 2008 Grammy Awards. The following year saw N...
Go to Profile#22524
Aram Saroyan
#22535
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (83 years)
Aram Saroyan is an American poet, novelist, biographer, memoirist and playwright, who is especially known for his minimalist poetry, famous examples of which include the one-word poem "lighght" and a one-letter poem comprising a four-legged version of the letter "m".
Go to Profile#22525
Karen E. Smith
#22536
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
Karen Ellen Smith is an American mathematician, specializing in commutative algebra and algebraic geometry. She completed her bachelor's degree in mathematics at Princeton University before earning her PhD in mathematics at the University of Michigan in 1993. Currently she is the Keeler Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan. In addition to being a researcher in algebraic geometry and commutative algebra, Smith with others wrote the textbook An Invitation to Algebraic Geometry.
Go to Profile#22526
John M. Barry
#22537
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
John M. Barry is an American author and historian who has written books on the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the influenza pandemic of 1918, and the development of the modern form of the ideas of separation of church and state and individual liberty. He is a professor at the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and Distinguished Scholar at Tulane's Bywater Institute.
Go to Profile#22527
Tzipi Livni
#22538
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Tziporah Malka "Tzipi" Livni is an Israeli politician, diplomat, and lawyer. A former member of the Knesset and leader in the center-left political camp, Livni is a former foreign minister, vice prime minister, minister of justice, and leader of the opposition. She is known by some for her efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
Go to Profile#22528
Tsvia Walden
#22539
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Tsvia Walden is an Israeli psycholinguist. She is a professor at the Ben Gurion University of the Negev and previously a senior lecturer at Beit Berl Academic College and Ben-Gurion University. Walden specializes in social constructionism through language, language and gender, language acquisition, literacy, digital literacy and research of Jewish texts. She is the creator and presenter of a filmed lecture series about language instruction and language acquisition.
Go to Profile#22529
Matthew Hayden
#22540
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (55 years)
Matthew Lawrence Hayden is an Australian cricket commentator and former cricketer. His career spanned fifteen years. Hayden was a powerful and aggressive left-handed opening batsman, who along with opening partners, Justin Langer and Adam Gilchrist contributed heavily to Australia's success during its "golden era" in Test and ODI cricket respectively. He is widely considered to be one of the best openers in Test cricket and holds the record of highest individual score by an Australian batsman in Test, where he scored 380 against Zimbabwe during Zimbabwe's 2003 tour of Australia. This stand...
Go to Profile#22530
Gintaras Beresnevičius
#22541
Overall Influence
1961 - 2006 (45 years)
Gintaras Beresnevičius was a Lithuanian historian of religions specializing in Baltic mythology. He together with Norbertas Vėlius is considered to be the best specialist in Lithuanian mythology. In 1984 he graduated from Vilnius University, Faculty of History. Since 1986 he worked at various universities. In 1993 he received his Ph.D. He published over 100 scientific articles. Beresnevičius worked with journal "Naujasis Židinys" and weekly "Šiaurės Atėnai" . In 2001 he received an award from the President of Lithuania for his collection of essays on history of Lithuania called "Ant laiko aš...
Go to Profile#22531
Henrik Larsson
#22542
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (55 years)
Edward Henrik Larsson is a Swedish professional football coach and former player. Playing as a striker, Larsson began his career with Högaborgs BK. In 1992, he moved to Helsingborg IF where in his first season his partnership up front with Mats Magnusson helped the club win promotion to Allsvenskan after 24 seasons in the lower tiers. He moved to Feyenoord in November 1993, staying for four years before leaving in 1997. During his time in the Dutch Eredivisie, he won two KNVB Cups with Feyenoord. He also broke into the Swedish national football team, and helped them finish in third place at t...
Go to Profile#22532
Juan Mónaco
#22543
Overall Influence
1984 - Present (42 years)
Juan Mónaco , nicknamed "Pico", is an Argentine former professional tennis player. He won nine singles titles, reached the semifinals of the 2010 Shanghai Masters and the 2012 Miami Masters, and achieved a career-high singles ranking of world no. 10 in July 2012. He announced his retirement from professional tennis on 15 May 2017.
Go to Profile#22533
David Bromwich
#22544
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (75 years)
David Bromwich is Sterling Professor of English at Yale University. Career After graduating from Yale with a B.A. in 1973 and a Ph.D. four years later, Bromwich became an instructor at Princeton University, where he was promoted to Mellon Professor of English before returning to Yale in 1988. In 1995 he was appointed Housum Professor of English at Yale. In 2006 he became a Sterling Professor.
Go to Profile#22534
Leo Ruickbie
#22545
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Leo Ruickbie is a British historian and sociologist of religion, specializing in exceptional experiences, paranormal beliefs, magic, witchcraft and Wicca. He is the author of several books, beginning with Witchcraft Out of the Shadows, a 2004 publication outlining the history of witchcraft from ancient Greece until the modern day. Ruickbie was born in Scotland and took a master's degree in Sociology and Religion at the University of Lancaster. He then studied at King's College London and was an awarded a PhD for his thesis entitled The Re-Enchanters: Theorising Re-Enchantment and Testing for its Presence in Modern Witchcraft.
Go to Profile#22535
William A. Gamson
#22546
Overall Influence
1934 - 2021 (87 years)
William Anthony Gamson was a professor of Sociology at Boston College, where he was also the co-director of the Media Research and Action Project . He is the author of numerous books and articles on political discourse, the mass-media and social movements from as early as the 1960s. His influential works include Power and Discontent , The Strategy of Social Protest , Encounters with Unjust Authority and Talking Politics , as well as numerous editions of SIMSOC.
Go to Profile#22536
Carlos Alberto Torres
#22547
Overall Influence
1944 - 2016 (72 years)
Carlos Alberto "Capita" Torres , also known as "O Capitão do Tri", was a Brazilian football player and manager who played as an attacking right-sided full-back or wing-back. A technically gifted defender with good ball skills and defensive capabilities, he is widely regarded as one of the best defenderss of all time. He also stood out for his leadership, and was an excellent penalty taker. Nicknamed O Capitão, he captained the Brazil national team to victory in the 1970 World Cup, scoring the fourth goal in the final, considered one of the greatest goals in the history of the tournament.
Go to Profile#22537
Tor Wager
#22548
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Tor D. Wager is the Diana L. Taylor Distinguished Professor in Neuroscience at Dartmouth College, as well as the director of the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory at this university. He is known for his research into the placebo effect and into the way the brain processes pain.
Go to Profile#22538
Fiona Scott Morton
#22549
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (59 years)
Fiona M. Scott Morton is an American economist who serves as the Theodore Nierenberg Professor at Yale School of Management. Her research in industrial organization has covered industries including magazines, shipping, pharmaceuticals, and internet retail. She served as associate dean of the Yale School of Management from 2007 to 2010.
Go to Profile#22539
Lajos Pósa
#22550
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Lajos Pósa is a Hungarian mathematician working in the topic of combinatorics, and one of the most prominent mathematics educators of Hungary, best known for his mathematics camps for gifted students. He is a winner of the Széchenyi Prize. Paul Erdős's favorite "child", he discovered theorems at the age of 13. Since 2002, he has worked at the Rényi Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences; earlier he was at the Eötvös Loránd University, at the Departments of Mathematical Analysis, Computer Science.
Go to Profile#22540
Dick Armey
#22551
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
Richard Keith Armey is an American economist and politician. He was a U.S. Representative from Texas's and House Majority Leader . He was one of the engineers of the "Republican Revolution" of the 1990s, in which Republicans were elected to majorities of both houses of Congress for the first time in four decades. Armey was one of the chief authors of the Contract with America. Armey is also an author and former economics professor. After his retirement from Congress, he has worked as a consultant, advisor, and lobbyist.
Go to Profile#22541
Paul Nation
#22552
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Ian Stephen Paul Nation is an internationally recognized scholar in the field of linguistics and teaching methodology. As a professor in the field of applied linguistics with a specialization in pedagogical methodology, he has been able to create a language teaching framework to identify key areas of language teaching focus. Stephen is best known for this framework, which has been labelled The Four Strands. He has also made notable contributions through his research in the field of language acquisition that focuses on the benefits of extensive reading and repetition as well as intensive reading.
Go to Profile#22542
Laura Dern
#22553
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (59 years)
Laura Elizabeth Dern is an American actress. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, a BAFTA Award, and five Golden Globe Awards. Born to actors Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd, Dern embarked on an acting career in the 1980s and rose to prominence for her performances in Mask and the David Lynch films Blue Velvet and Wild at Heart . She received her first Academy Award nomination for her portrayal of the titular orphan in the drama film Rambling Rose , and her first Golden Globe win for her performance in the television film Afterburn . She ...
Go to Profile#22543
Ramakant Yadav
#22554
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Ramakant Yadav is a professor of Neurology and Yash Bharti Award winner who is working at Uttar Pradesh University of Medical Sciences, Saifai. Education and career He completed his M.B.B.S. in 1992 and M.D. in 1998 from Sarojini Naidu Medical College, Agra of Agra University , Agra. Later he joined Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow and got D.M. degree in 2006. He became a fellow of Indian Association of Clinical Medicine in 2008. He joined U.P. Rural Institute of Medical Sciences, now known as Uttar Pradesh University of Medical Sciences, Saifai as an assistant professor in 2006 and now working as a professor there.
Go to Profile#22544
Eric Goldman
#22555
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Eric Goldman is a law professor at Santa Clara University School of Law. He also co-directs the law school's High Tech Law Institute and co-supervises the law school's Privacy Law Certificate. Career overview Goldman is a leading expert in the fields of Internet Law and Intellectual Property. He was part of the first wave of teaching Internet Law courses in law schools, having taught his first course in 1995–96. He has testified before Congress on the Consumer Review Fairness Act, Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act , and Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act . In a well-...
Go to Profile#22545
Robert W. Thomson
#22556
Overall Influence
1934 - 2018 (84 years)
Robert William Thomson was Calouste Gulbenkian Professor of Armenian Studies at Oxford University. Thomson graduated from the University of Cambridge with a degree in classics, then studied at the Halki seminary in Turkey. Thomson received his PhD from Cambridge after defending his doctoral dissertation on Armenian and Syriac versions of Athanasius of Alexandria's works.
Go to Profile#22546
Robert Hamada
#22557
Overall Influence
1937 - Present (89 years)
Robert Hamada is the former Edward Eagle Brown Distinguished Service Professor of Finance and former Dean of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Early life A third-generation Japanese American, Hamada was born in San Francisco, California in 1937. He and his family were sent to the Amache internment camp during World War II due to Executive Order 9066. Following their release, the Hamada family moved to New York.
Go to Profile#22547
Serge Berstein
#22558
Overall Influence
1934 - Present (92 years)
Serge Berstein is a French historian, well known as a specialist of the French Third Republic. He is a teacher at Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris.
Go to Profile#22548
Owen Holland
#22559
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Owen Holland is professor emeritus of cognitive robotics in the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science at the University of Sussex. He was until recently a professor of computer science at the University of Essex, England. Previously, he has held faculty positions at Caltech, University of Bielefeld, Starlab and the University of the West of England.
Go to Profile#22549
Howard Thompson
#22560
Overall Influence
1919 - 2002 (83 years)
Howard Thompson was an American journalist and film critic whose career of forty-one years was spent at The New York Times. Henry Howard Thompson Jr. was born in Natchez, the seat of Mississippi's Adams County. He began his college studies at Louisiana State University, but left to serve as a paratrooper in the United States Army during World War II. During this period, Thompson was captured and spent six months in a German prisoner of war camp. After demobilisation, he continued his studies at Columbia University. In 1947, he joined The New York Times as an office boy in the personnel depart...
Go to Profile#22550
Jack Goldman
#22561
Overall Influence
1921 - 2011 (90 years)
Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman was an American physicist and former chief scientist of Xerox Corporation. He was also a faculty member at Carnegie Tech and directed the Ford Scientific Laboratory. He is especially notable for hiring physicist Dr. George Pake to create the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, which produced many seminal ideas in modern computing.
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