The Most Influential Philosophers in History
From ancient Athens to the Enlightenment and beyond, these thinkers shaped how humanity reasons about truth, ethics, and existence.
- 1 98
Aristotle
Philosopher · 384 BC – 322 BC
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath whose writings on logic, ethics, biology, politics and metaphysics shaped Western thought for over two millennia.
- 2 97
Confucius
Philosopher · 551 BC – 479 BC
Confucius was a Chinese philosopher and teacher whose ideas on ethics, family and good government became the foundation of Confucianism and shaped East Asian civilization for over two thousand years.
- 3 97
Siddhartha Gautama
Spiritual Leader · 563 BC – 483 BC
Siddhartha Gautama, known as the Buddha, was a spiritual teacher of ancient India whose insights into suffering and liberation founded Buddhism, now one of the world's major religions.
- 4 96
Plato
Philosopher · 428 BC – 348 BC
Plato was a Greek philosopher who founded the Academy in Athens, wrote the foundational dialogues of Western philosophy, and developed the influential theory of Forms.
- 5 95
Karl Marx
Philosopher · 1818 – 1883
Karl Marx was a German philosopher, economist, and revolutionary whose theories of historical materialism and class struggle, set out in The Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital, became among the most influential and contested ideas in modern history.
- 6 95
Socrates
Philosopher · 470 BC – 399 BC
Socrates was a classical Greek philosopher credited as a founder of Western philosophy, famous for the Socratic method of questioning and for his trial and execution in Athens.
- 7 94
Immanuel Kant
Philosopher · 1724 – 1804
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher of the Enlightenment, one of the most influential thinkers in history, who reconciled rationalism and empiricism and transformed ethics, metaphysics and epistemology.
- 8 93
John Locke
Philosopher · 1632 – 1704
John Locke was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as the father of liberalism, whose theories of empiricism, natural rights, and government by consent shaped the Enlightenment and the founding of modern democracies.
- 9 93
Laozi
Philosopher · 571 BC – 471 BC
Laozi was a semi-legendary ancient Chinese philosopher traditionally regarded as the founder of Daoism and the author of the Tao Te Ching, the foundational text on living in harmony with the Dao.
- 10 92
Augustine of Hippo
Theologian · 354 – 430
Augustine of Hippo was a Roman North African theologian and philosopher whose works, including Confessions and City of God, shaped Western Christianity and laid intellectual foundations for medieval and modern thought.
- 11 92
Friedrich Nietzsche
Philosopher · 1844 – 1900
Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher whose radical critiques of morality, religion, and truth—including the proclamation that "God is dead" and the ideal of the Übermensch—made him one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the modern era.
- 12 92
René Descartes
Philosopher · 1596 – 1650
René Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician and scientist, the "father of modern philosophy", famous for "I think, therefore I am" and for founding analytic geometry.
- 13 91
Thomas Aquinas
Theologian · 1225 – 1274
Thomas Aquinas was a medieval Italian theologian and philosopher whose synthesis of Christian theology and Aristotelian philosophy became central to Catholic thought and the high point of scholasticism.
- 14 90
Adam Smith
Economist · 1723 – 1790
Adam Smith was a Scottish Enlightenment philosopher and economist, the father of modern economics, whose work The Wealth of Nations laid the foundations of free-market thought.
- 15 90
Avicenna
Physician · 980 – 1037
Avicenna was a Persian polymath of the Islamic Golden Age, one of the greatest physicians and philosophers of the medieval world, whose Canon of Medicine was a standard text for six centuries.
- 16 90
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Philosopher · 1712 – 1778
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan-French philosopher, writer, and composer whose ideas on the social contract, the general will, and natural human goodness shaped modern political thought, education, and the Romantic movement.
- 17 90
Marcus Aurelius
Emperor · 121 – 180
Marcus Aurelius was a Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, the last of the "Five Good Emperors", whose private journal, the Meditations, is the most cherished work of Stoic thought.
- 18 90
Pythagoras
Mathematician · 570 BC – 495 BC
Pythagoras was an ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher who founded the Pythagorean school and is remembered for the Pythagorean theorem and the idea that number underlies the cosmos.
- 19 90
Voltaire
Writer · 1694 – 1778
Voltaire was a French Enlightenment writer, philosopher and wit, a tireless champion of reason, free speech and religious tolerance and one of the most influential figures of his age.
- 20 89
David Hume
Philosopher · 1711 – 1776
David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, and economist of the Enlightenment whose rigorous empiricism and skepticism—especially his analysis of causation and the problem of induction—made him one of the most important philosophers in the English language.
- 21 88
Cicero
Statesman · 106 BC – 43 BC
Cicero was a Roman statesman, orator and philosopher whose speeches and writings defined Latin prose, transmitted Greek philosophy to Rome, and championed the values of the Roman Republic.
- 22 88
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Philosopher · 1770 – 1831
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher and the leading figure of German idealism, whose dialectical method and grand vision of history as the self-development of Spirit profoundly shaped modern philosophy.
- 23 88
Niccolò Machiavelli
Philosopher · 1469 – 1527
Niccolò Machiavelli was a Renaissance Italian diplomat, political philosopher and writer whose treatise The Prince founded modern political science and gave his name to ruthless statecraft.
- 24 88
Thomas Hobbes
Philosopher · 1588 – 1679
Thomas Hobbes was an English philosopher whose masterwork Leviathan founded modern political philosophy, arguing that to escape the violent state of nature people must submit to a powerful sovereign through a social contract.
- 25 87
Averroes
Philosopher · 1126 – 1198
Averroes was a philosopher and polymath of Al-Andalus whose commentaries on Aristotle profoundly shaped medieval European philosophy and the relationship between reason and faith.
- 26 87
Baruch Spinoza
Philosopher · 1632 – 1677
Baruch Spinoza was a Dutch philosopher of the early modern era whose rationalist masterpiece, the Ethics, advanced a radical monism identifying God with Nature and made him a foundational figure of modern thought.
- 27 87
John Stuart Mill
Philosopher · 1806 – 1873
John Stuart Mill was an English philosopher and economist, the leading liberal thinker of the nineteenth century, whose works on utilitarianism, liberty, and the rights of women shaped modern political and ethical thought.
- 28 86
Zeno of Citium
Philosopher · 334 BC – 262 BC
Zeno of Citium was an ancient Greek philosopher who founded Stoicism, teaching that virtue and reason are the path to a good life, in lectures given at the Painted Porch (Stoa) in Athens.
- 29 85
Mary Wollstonecraft
Writer · 1759 – 1797
Mary Wollstonecraft was an English Enlightenment writer and philosopher, a pioneer of feminist thought whose A Vindication of the Rights of Woman argued for the education and equality of women.
- 30 84
Hypatia
Mathematician · 360 – 415
Hypatia was a mathematician, astronomer and Neoplatonist philosopher of late-antique Alexandria, the most prominent woman scholar of the ancient world, whose brutal murder came to symbolize the end of classical learning.