Great Thinkers

Meet the great minds whose ideas have shaped the world — philosophers, scientists, artists, leaders, and revolutionaries whose thinking still matters today.

Filter by subject area
Biology 2 Chemistry 3 Mathematics 6 Technology & Engineering 3
Philosophy 11 History 6 Literature 11 Arts 3
Anthropology & Culture 7 Sociology 3 Religion 2 Education 4 Politics 4
Law 3 Economics 11 Business & Management 2
81 thinkers
Clear all filters
Era: Contemporary × Research skills × Page 1 of 4
Arts
Akira Kurosawa
1910-1998 · Japan
Akira Kurosawa (1910-1998) was a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and editor whose thirty completed feature films include some of the most influential works in the…
Creative expression Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking +1
"To be an artist means never to avert one's eyes."
Meet this Thinker →
Economics
Arthur Lewis
1915-1991 · Saint Lucia
Arthur Lewis was an economist. He was born in 1915 on the Caribbean island of Saint Lucia, which was then a British colony. His parents…
Critical thinking Problem solving Research skills Cultural heritage and identity +1
"The fundamental cure for poverty is not money but knowledge."
Meet this Thinker →
Anthropology & Culture
Arturo Escobar
born 1951 · Colombia
Arturo Escobar is an anthropologist. An anthropologist studies human societies, cultures, and ways of life. He was born in 1951 in Manizales, a city in…
Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"Escobar argues that calling a country 'underdeveloped' is not a neutral description but a powerful act."
Meet this Thinker →
Literature
Audre Lorde
1934-1992 · United States
Audre Lorde (1934-1992) was an American poet, essayist, teacher, and political activist whose work insisted on the interconnection of race, gender, sexuality, and class in…
Creative expression Ethical thinking Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives."
Meet this Thinker →
Business & Management
C.K. Prahalad
1941-2010 · India / United States
Coimbatore Krishnarao Prahalad (1941-2010) was an Indian-American management scholar whose ideas about corporate strategy, core competence, and the business opportunity at the bottom of the…
Critical thinking Creative expression Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"The roots of competitive advantage are buried deep inside the corporation."
Meet this Thinker →
History
C.L.R. James
1901-1989 · Trinidad and Tobago
Cyril Lionel Robert James was a Trinidadian historian, political thinker, novelist, and cricket writer. He is one of the most important intellectuals the Caribbean has…
Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Creative expression +1
"What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?"
Meet this Thinker →
Business & Management
Chester Barnard
1886-1961 · United States
Chester Irving Barnard (1886-1961) was an American business executive whose book The Functions of the Executive (1938) became one of the foundational works of mid-twentieth-century…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Problem solving Research skills +1
"An organization is a system of consciously coordinated activities or forces of two or more persons."
Meet this Thinker →
Literature
Christopher Hitchens
1949 - 2011 · United Kingdom (later United States)
Christopher Hitchens was a British-American journalist, essayist, and writer. He was one of the most famous public intellectuals of the late 20th and early 21st…
Creative expression Critical thinking Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."
Meet this Thinker →
Anthropology & Culture
Claude Lévi-Strauss
1908-2009 · Belgium / France
Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908-2009) was a Belgian-French anthropologist, one of the most influential social scientists of the twentieth century. He was born in Brussels to a…
Critical thinking Research skills Storytelling and narrative Scientific thinking +1
"The world began without man and will end without him."
Meet this Thinker →
Mathematics
Claude Shannon
1916 - 2001 · United States
Claude Shannon was an American mathematician and engineer. He invented the field of information theory. His work made the digital age possible. Almost every technology…
Scientific thinking Problem solving Creative expression Research skills +1
"Information is the resolution of uncertainty."
Meet this Thinker →
Anthropology & Culture
Clifford Geertz
1926-2006 · United States
Clifford Geertz (1926-2006) was an American cultural anthropologist and one of the most influential social scientists of the twentieth century. He was born in San…
Research skills Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Storytelling and narrative +1
"Man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun. I take culture to be those webs."
Meet this Thinker →
Economics
Dambisa Moyo
born 1969 · Zambia
Dambisa Moyo is an economist and writer. She was born in 1969 in Lusaka, the capital of Zambia, in southern Africa. She spent part of…
Critical thinking Problem solving Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"Aid has been, and continues to be, an unmitigated political, economic, and humanitarian disaster for most parts of the developing…"
Meet this Thinker →
Chemistry
Dorothy Hodgkin
1910-1994 · United Kingdom
Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin was an English chemist. She remains the only British woman ever to win a Nobel Prize in any of the sciences. She…
Scientific thinking Problem solving Research skills Ethical thinking +1
"I was captured for life by chemistry and by crystals."
Meet this Thinker →
History
E.P. Thompson
1924-1993 · England, United Kingdom
E.P. Thompson (1924-1993) was a British historian, socialist activist, and peace campaigner. His full name was Edward Palmer Thompson. He was born in Oxford into…
Research skills Critical thinking Citizenship Cultural heritage and identity +1
"I am seeking to rescue the poor stockinger, the Luddite cropper, the obsolete hand-loom weaver, the utopian artisan and even…"
Meet this Thinker →
Anthropology & Culture
Eduardo Mondlane
1920-1969 · Mozambique (Portuguese East Africa)
Eduardo Chivambo Mondlane was a Mozambican anthropologist and revolutionary who founded FRELIMO, the movement that led Mozambique's independence struggle against Portugal. He was born in…
Ethical thinking Critical thinking Research skills Cultural heritage and identity +1
"We must build a society that is free from the exploitation of man by man."
Meet this Thinker →
Literature
Edward Said
1935-2003 · Palestine / United States
Edward Wadie Said was a Palestinian-American literary critic, public intellectual, and music critic. He was one of the founders of postcolonial studies. He was born…
Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"The Orient was almost a European invention, and had been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories…"
Meet this Thinker →
Politics
Elinor Ostrom
1933-2012 · United States
Elinor Ostrom (1933-2012) was an American political economist. She was born in Los Angeles and grew up during the Great Depression, a period of severe…
Environmental thinking Citizenship Systems thinking Financial literacy +1
"A lot of models in economics assume that human beings are fundamentally selfish. But the evidence shows that many people…"
Meet this Thinker →
History
Eric Hobsbawm
1917 - 2012 · Egypt / Austria / United Kingdom
Eric Hobsbawm was a British historian and one of the most influential historians of the 20th century. He wrote about the rise of capitalism, the…
Research skills Critical thinking Creative expression Ethical thinking +1
"The dustbin of history is humanity's largest receptacle."
Meet this Thinker →
Economics
Esther Duflo
1972-present · France / United States
Esther Duflo is a French-American economist. In 2019 she became, at age 46, the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic…
Scientific thinking Ethical thinking Research skills Problem solving +1
"It is not the magnitude of the problem that determines whether we can do something about it."
Meet this Thinker →
Technology & Engineering
Fazlur Rahman Khan
1929-1982 · Bangladesh / United States
Fazlur Rahman Khan (1929-1982) was a Bangladeshi-American structural engineer whose innovations transformed how tall buildings are designed and made the modern generation of skyscrapers possible.…
Scientific thinking Creative expression Research skills Critical thinking +1
"The technical man must not be lost in his own technology. He must be able to appreciate life, and life…"
Meet this Thinker →
Arts
Frida Kahlo
1907-1954 · Mexico
Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón (1907-1954) was a Mexican painter whose intensely personal and politically engaged work has made her one of the most…
Creative expression Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Critical thinking +1
"I paint myself because I am so often alone and because I am the subject I know best."
Meet this Thinker →
Economics
Friedrich Hayek
1899-1992 · Austria
Friedrich Hayek was an economist and political thinker. He was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1899 and died in 1992. His full name was Friedrich…
Critical thinking Problem solving Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"The curious task of economics is to show men how little they really know about what they imagine they can…"
Meet this Thinker →
Philosophy
G.E.M. Anscombe
1919-2001 · England (born in Ireland)
Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe was a British philosopher. She was one of the most important philosophers writing in English in the 20th century. She was…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Research skills +1
"For men to choose to kill the innocent as a means to their ends is always murder."
Meet this Thinker →
Literature
George Orwell
1903-1950 · England
George Orwell was the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair, an English writer, journalist, and essayist. He is one of the most quoted writers of…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Creative expression Research skills +1
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
Meet this Thinker →