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
#23451
William McCune
#23462
Overall Influence
1953 - 2011 (58 years)
William Walker McCune was an American computer scientist and logician working in the fields of automated reasoning, algebra, logic, and formal methods. He was best known for the development of the Otter, Prover9, and Mace4 automated reasoning systems, and the automated proof of the Robbins conjecture using the EQP theorem prover.
Go to Profile#23452
G. S. Maddala
#23463
Overall Influence
1933 - 1999 (66 years)
Gangadharrao Soundalyarao "G. S." Maddala was an Indian American economist, mathematician, and teacher, known for his contributions in the field of econometrics and for the textbooks he authored in this field.
Go to Profile#23453
Jeremy Sugarman
#23464
Overall Influence
Jeremy Sugarman is an American bioethicist and physician. He is the Harvey M. Meyerhoff Professor of Bioethics and Medicine at the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American College of Physicians, the National Academy of Medicine, and the Hastings Center.
Go to Profile#23454
Aimee Mann
#23465
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Aimee Elizabeth Mann is an American singer-songwriter. Over the course of four decades, she has released more than a dozen albums as a solo artist and with other musicians. Her work with the producer Jon Brion in the 1990s was influential on American alternative rock, and she is noted for her sardonic and literate lyrics about dark subjects.
Go to Profile#23455
George Michael
#23466
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
George Joseph Michael is an American historian, political scientist, and writer. He is a professor at the criminal justice faculty of Westfield State University in Massachusetts, and previously served as associate professor of nuclear counterproliferation and deterrence theory at the Air War College and as associate professor of political science and administration of justice at The University of Virginia's College at Wise. He studies right-wing extremism, including the relationship between militant Islam and the far right, and is the author of Confronting Right-Wing Extremism and Terrorism i...
Go to Profile#23456
Wiesław Binienda
#23467
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (70 years)
Wiesław Kazimierz Binienda is a Polish-American scientist, researcher, PhD, and professor and chairman of the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Akron. Research His research includes impact simulation, fracture and damage of advanced composite materials, explicit and implicit finite element mechanics, smart materials, structural design and optimization, characterization and constitutive equation development for ceramic matrix, metal matrix and polymer matrix composites.
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Peter Drahos
#23468
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Professor Peter Drahos is an Australian academic and researcher specializing in the areas of intellectual property and global business regulation amongst others. He is the Director of the Centre for Governance of Knowledge and Development and was formerly the Head of Program of the Regulatory Institutions Network at the Australian National University. He has served in an advisory capacity to various governments and international organisations on intellectual property issues and holds a Chair in Intellectual Property at the University of London. He is also a member of the Australian Bar. He was...
Go to Profile#23458
Abel Caballero
#23469
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Abel Ramón Caballero Álvarez is a Spanish professor of Economics and since June 2007, the current Mayor of Vigo, representing PSdeG-PSOE . Since 19 September 2015, he has also served as the president of the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces .
Go to Profile#23459
Victoria Hale
#23470
Overall Influence
Victoria Hale founded the nonprofit pharmaceutical company The Institute for OneWorld Health in San Francisco, California in 2000 and was its chairman and CEO until 2008, when she became Chair Emeritus. She then went on to found Medicines360, a nonprofit pharmaceutical company dedicated to developing medicines for women and children, including pregnant women.
Go to Profile#23460
Leszek Engelking
#23471
Overall Influence
1955 - 2022 (67 years)
Leszek Engelking was a Polish poet, short story writer, novelist, translator, literary critic, essayist, Polish philologist, and literary academic, scholar, and lecturer. Engelking translated a vast amount of literature into Polish, from Spanish, English, Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Slovak but in particular from Czech.
Go to Profile#23461
Scott Thornbury
#23472
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Scott Thornbury is an internationally recognized academic and teacher trainer in the field of English Language Teaching . Along with Luke Meddings, Thornbury is credited with developing the Dogme language teaching approach, which emphasizes meaningful interaction and emergent language over prepared materials and following an explicit syllabus. Thornbury has written over a dozen books on ELT methodology. Two of these, 'Natural Grammar' and 'Teaching Unplugged', have won the British Council's "ELTon" Award for Innovation, the top award in the industry .
Go to Profile#23462
Robert Stephen John Sparks
#23473
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
#23463
James M. Rubenstein
#23474
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
James M. Rubenstein is an American geographer and Professor of Geography at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, known for his work on human geography and specifically on the US automotive industry. Rubenstein obtained his B.A. in public affairs from the University of Chicago in 1970, and went to London where he obtained his MSc in city and regional planning from the London School of Economics in 1971. Back in the States he obtained his PhD in geography and human engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 1975. Rubenstein is appointed Professor of Geography at Miami University. He also wor...
Go to Profile#23464
Anthony Pym
#23475
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (70 years)
Anthony David Pym is a scholar best known for his work in translation studies. Pym is Distinguished Professor of Translation and Intercultural Studies at Rovira i Virgili University in Spain and Professor Extraordinary at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. He was a fellow of the Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies from 2010 to 2015, Visiting Researcher at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey from 2008 to 2016, Walter Benjamin Visiting Professor at the University of Vienna in 2015, and President of the European Society for Translation Studies f...
Go to Profile#23465
Carmen Iglesias
#23476
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (84 years)
María del Carmen Iglesias Cano, 1st Countess of Gilbert, is a Spanish historian. She is a member of the Real Academia de la Historia since 1991 and its first female director since 2014. As Director of the Real Academia de la Historia, she has been responsible for the launch of the electronic version of Spain´s dictionary of national biography, the Diccionario biográfico español.
Go to Profile#23466
Glenn McGrath
#23477
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Glenn Donald McGrath is an Australian former international cricketer whose career spanned 14 years. He was a fast-medium pace bowler and is considered one of the greatest bowlers of all time, and a leading contributor to Australia's domination of world cricket from the mid-1990s to the late 2000s. McGrath was a member of the Australian team that won three consecutive World Cup trophies in a row, winning the 1999 Cricket World Cup, the 2003 Cricket World Cup, and the 2007 Cricket World Cup. In the 2003 final, he took the winning wicket of Zaheer Khan. McGrath was also a member of the team tha...
Go to Profile#23467
Richard F. Ericson
#23478
Overall Influence
1919 - 1993 (74 years)
Richard Ferdinand Ericson was an American organizational theorist, professor emeritus of management and director of the Interdisciplinary Systems and Cybernetics Project, Program of Policy Studies in Science and Technology at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
Go to Profile#23468
Maurice Iwu
#23479
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Maurice Mmaduakolam Iwu is a Nigerian professor of pharmacognosy who was appointed Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission in June 2005, and was removed from office in April 2010.
Go to Profile#23469
Patrick McGrath
#23480
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Patrick McGrath is a British novelist, whose work has been categorised as gothic fiction. Early life McGrath was born in London and grew up near Broadmoor Hospital from the age of five where his father was Medical Superintendent. He was educated at a Jesuit boarding school in Windsor from the age of thirteen, before moving to another Jesuit public school, Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, upon the closure of his first school. In 1967, at the age of sixteen, he ran away from this institution to London. He graduated from the Birmingham College of Commerce with an honours degree in English and A...
Go to Profile#23470
Bob Blauner
#23481
Overall Influence
1929 - 2016 (87 years)
Robert "Bob" Blauner was an American sociologist, college professor and author. He introduced the theory of internal colonialism. Biography He was born in Chicago, Illinois. Bob spent his high school years at Sullivan High School in Chicago. He was the editor of the school paper, the Sentinel. He was also the valedictorian of his high school class. He was interested in sports and was an avid tennis player. His friends in high school included LeRoy Wollins who went on to be active in Veterans for Peace and earned his living importing Russian language materials. Another friend was Charles Ga...
Go to Profile#23471
Wasfia Nazreen
#23482
Overall Influence
1982 - Present (44 years)
Wasfia Nazreen is a Bangladeshi mountaineer, activist, environmentalist, social worker and writer. Nazreen is the first Bengali and Bangladeshi to scale K2, the world's second highest and most dangerous peak becoming one of the 40 women in history since 1954 to have successfully scaled K2.
Go to Profile#23472
Nicholas S. Zeppos
#23483
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Nicholas S. Zeppos is an American lawyer and university administrator. He was the eighth chancellor of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. On April 2, 2019, Zeppos announced that he would be stepping down from the position on August 15 of the same year.
Go to Profile#23473
Anita Heiss
#23484
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Anita Marianne Heiss is an Aboriginal Australian author, poet, cultural activist and social commentator. She is an advocate for Indigenous Australian literature and literacy, through her writing for adults and children and her membership of boards and committees.
Go to Profile#23474
Neil McKendrick
#23485
Overall Influence
1935 - Present (91 years)
Neil McKendrick MA FRHistS was the 40th Master of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He is now a life fellow of the college. McKendrick was educated at Alderman Newton's School, Leicester, and Christ's College, Cambridge, where he won an Entrance Scholarship. He is an Emeritus Reader in History having taught Modern English Social and Economic History as well as Business, Literature and Society, 1690–1990. He is also a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. During his time at the college he was successively Lecturer in History, Director of Studies in History, Graduate Tutor and Master.
Go to Profile#23475
Roland Emmerich
#23486
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Roland Emmerich is a German film director, screenwriter, and producer. He is widely known for his science fiction and disaster films and has been called a "master of disaster" within the industry. His films, most of which are English-language Hollywood productions, have made more than $3 billion worldwide, including just over $1 billion in the United States, making him the country's 15th-highest-grossing director of all time.
Go to Profile#23476
George Pérez
#23487
Overall Influence
1954 - 2022 (68 years)
George Pérez was an American comic book artist and writer, who worked primarily as a penciller. He came to prominence in the 1970s penciling Fantastic Four and The Avengers for Marvel Comics. In the 1980s he penciled The New Teen Titans, which became one of DC Comics' top-selling series. He penciled DC's landmark limited series Crisis on Infinite Earths, followed by relaunching Wonder Woman as both writer and penciller for the rebooted series. In the meantime, he worked on other comics published by Marvel, DC, and other companies into the 2010s. He was known for his detailed and realistic ren...
Go to Profile#23477
Michele Bachmann
#23488
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (70 years)
Michele Marie Bachmann is an American politician who was the U.S. representative for from 2007 until 2015. A member of the Republican Party, she was a candidate for president of the United States in the 2012 election, but lost the Republican nomination to Mitt Romney.
Go to Profile#23478
JoAnne Stubbe
#23489
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
JoAnne Stubbe is an American chemist best known for her work on ribonucleotide reductases, for which she was awarded the National Medal of Science in 2009. In 2017, she retired as a Professor of Chemistry and Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Go to Profile#23479
Ken Freeman
#23490
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
Kenneth Charles Freeman is an Australian astronomer and astrophysicist who is currently Duffield Professor of Astronomy in the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Mount Stromlo Observatory of the Australian National University in Canberra. He was born in Perth, Western Australia in 1940, studied mathematics and physics at the University of Western Australia, and graduated with first class honours in applied mathematics in 1962. He then went to Cambridge University for postgraduate work in theoretical astrophysics with Leon Mestel and Donald Lynden-Bell, and completed his doctorate in 1965.
Go to Profile#23480
Ian Dury
#23491
Overall Influence
1942 - 2000 (58 years)
Ian Robins Dury was an English singer, songwriter and actor who rose to fame in the late 1970s, during the punk and new wave era of rock music. He was the lead singer and lyricist of Ian Dury and the Blockheads and previously Kilburn and the High Roads.
Go to Profile#23481
Roger D. Abrahams
#23492
Overall Influence
1933 - 2017 (84 years)
Roger David Abrahams was an American folklorist whose work focused on the expressive cultures and cultural histories of the Americas, with a specific emphasis on African American peoples and traditions.
Go to Profile#23482
Claudia Emerson
#23493
Overall Influence
1957 - 2014 (57 years)
Claudia Emerson was an American poet. She won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for her poetry collection Late Wife, and was named the Poet Laureate of Virginia by Governor Tim Kaine in 2008. Early life Emerson was born on January 13, 1957, in Chatham, Virginia, and graduated from Chatham Hall preparatory school in 1975. She received her BA in English from the University of Virginia in 1979 and her Master of Fine Arts in creative writing at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1991.
Go to Profile#23483
Claire Palley
#23494
Overall Influence
1931 - Present (95 years)
Claire Dorothea Taylor Palley, OBE is a South African academic and lawyer who specialises in constitutional and human rights law. She was the first woman to hold a Chair in Law at a United Kingdom university when she was appointed at Queen's University Belfast in 1970.
Go to Profile#23484
Richard Breitman
#23495
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Richard David Breitman, born in 1947, is an American historian best known for his study of the Holocaust. Richard Breitman is an American historian who has written extensively on modern German history, the Holocaust, American immigration and refugee policy, and intelligence during and after World War II. He has spent his career in the history department at American University in Washington, D.C., from which he retired as distinguished professor emeritus in 2015. He has written or co-authored twelve books and served for twenty-five years as editor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, a scholarly ...
Go to Profile#23485
Robert Olen Butler
#23496
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Robert Olen Butler is an American fiction writer. His short-story collection A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1993. Early life Butler was born in Granite City, Illinois, to Robert Olen Butler Sr., an actor and theater professor who became the chairman of the theater department of Saint Louis University, and his wife, the former Lucille Frances Hall, an executive secretary.
Go to Profile#23486
Fred D'Aguiar
#23497
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Fred D'Aguiar is a British-Guyanese poet, novelist, and playwright of Portuguese descent. He is currently Professor of English at the University of California, Los Angeles . Life Fred D'Aguiar was born in London, England, in 1960 to Guyanese parents, Malcolm Frederick D'Aguiar and Kathleen Agatha Messiah. In 1962 he was taken to Guyana, living there with his grandmother until 1972, when he returned to England at the age of 12.
Go to Profile#23487
Richard D. Hansen
#23498
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Richard D. Hansen is an American archaeologist who is an adjunct professor of anthropology at the University of Utah. Career Hansen is a specialist on the ancient Maya civilization and directs the Mirador Basin Project, which investigates a circumscribed geological and cultural area known as the Mirador Basin in the northern Petén, Guatemala. He has previously held positions at the University of California, Los Angeles and Idaho State University. He is also the founder and president of the Foundation for Anthropological Research and Environmental Studies . His work has been featured in 36 fil...
Go to Profile#23488
Albert Uderzo
#23499
Overall Influence
1927 - 2020 (93 years)
Alberto Aleandro Uderzo , better known as Albert Uderzo , was a French comic book artist and scriptwriter. He is best known as the co-creator and illustrator of the Astérix series in collaboration with René Goscinny. He also drew other comics such as Oumpah-pah, again with Goscinny. Uderzo retired in September 2011.
Go to Profile#23489
Yehezkel Dror
#23500
Overall Influence
1928 - Present (98 years)
Yehezkel Dror is a professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Biography Arthur Yehezkel Dror was born in Vienna, Austria. He immigrated to Mandate Palestine with his family in 1938. He graduated from the Hebrew Reali School in Haifa in 1946.
Go to Profile#23490
John Robert Greene
#23501
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
John Robert Greene is an American historian who was the Paul J. Schupf Professor, History and Humanities, the director of the History Program, co-director of the History/Social Science major, and the College Archivist, at Cazenovia College in Cazenovia, New York. Greene specializes in American history, with research and writing interests in the American presidency. He has edited or written twenty books, including works on Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush. He has also written several volumes on the history of higher education.
Go to Profile#23491
Martin Eichenbaum
#23502
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Martin Stewart Eichenbaum is the Charles Moskos professor of economics at Northwestern University, and the co-director of the Center for International Economics and Development. His research focuses on macroeconomics, international economics, and monetary theory and policy.
Go to Profile#23492
Brian Sherwin
#23503
Overall Influence
1980 - Present (46 years)
Brian Sherwin is an American art critic, writer, and blogger with a degree from Illinois College in 2003. Sherwin is a founding Management Team member of the artist social networking site myartspace, where he also served as Senior Editor for six years. As Senior Editor for myartspace.com Sherwin established an extensive interview series with emerging and established visual artists. Sherwin currently writes for FineArtViews and is the editor of The Art Edge. Sherwin is also an advocate for youth art education.
Go to Profile#23493
Hattie Gossett
#23504
Overall Influence
Hattie Gossett is an African-American feminist playwright, poet, and magazine editor. Her work focuses on bolstering the self-esteem of young black women. Biography Born in New Jersey, Gossett gained a Master of Fine Arts degree from New York University in 1993, where she was a Yip Harburg Fellow. She was a David Randolph Distinguished Artist-in-Residence at The New School in 2001.
Go to Profile#23494
Haziqul Khairi
#23505
Overall Influence
1931 - 2023 (92 years)
Haziqul Khairi was a Pakistani jurist and author who served as Chief Justice of the Federal Shariat Court of Pakistan, Judge of the Sindh High Court, Ombudsman of Sindh and Principal of Sindh Muslim Law College. He was the grandson of eminent British India social reformer, Allama Rashid ul Khairi.
Go to Profile#23495
Susan B. Neuman
#23506
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Susan Neuman is an educator, researcher, and education policy-maker in early childhood and literacy development. In 2013, she became Professor of Early Childhood and Literacy Education, and Chair of the Department of Teaching and Learning at NYU's Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.
Go to Profile#23496
Sandro Nielsen
#23507
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Sandro Nielsen is a Danish metalexicographer, Associate Professor at Centre for Lexicography at the Aarhus School of Business, Denmark, from where he received his PhD in 1992. Nielsen has contributed to lexicography as a theoretical and practical lexicographer with particular reference to bilingual and multilingual specialised dictionaries . He is the author and co-author of more than one hundred publications on lexicography, theoretical papers, printed and electronic dictionaries.
Go to Profile#23497
William Regal
#23508
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Darren Kenneth Matthews , better known by the ring name William Regal, is an English retired professional wrestler. He is currently signed to WWE, where he serves as the Vice President of Global Talent Development. He is also known for his work as a wrestler in World Championship Wrestling and as a manager in All Elite Wrestling .
Go to Profile#23498
Jean Twenge
#23509
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (55 years)
Jean Marie Twenge is an American psychologist researching generational differences, including work values, life goals, and speed of development. She is a professor of psychology at San Diego State University, author, consultant, and public speaker. She has examined generational differences in work attitudes, life goals, developmental speed, sexual behavior, and religious commitment.
Go to Profile#23499
Harrison Pope
#23510
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Harrison Graham "Skip" Pope, Jr. , is an American professor and physician, currently Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and an attending physician at McLean Hospital. He is also the Director, Biological Psychiatry Laboratory at McLean's. According to the ISI index, he is one of the most highly cited psychiatrists of the 20th century. Pope's research focus is on substance abuse, especially anabolic steroids, marijuana, hallucinogens, and MDMA. In his book the Adonis Complex, he argues that the media fuels body image disorders for not only women but men as well. He has also wri...
Go to Profile#23500
Péter Pál Pálfy
#23511
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Péter Pál Pálfy is a Hungarian mathematician, working in algebra, more precisely in group theory and universal algebra. Between 2006 and 2018 he served as the director of the Alfréd Rényi Institute of Mathematics.
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