# The greatest philosophers (BBC Radio 4 listeners' poll)

The top 10 of the In Our Time poll to find the greatest philosopher, voted by about 30,000 BBC Radio 4 listeners in 2005. Karl Marx won by a wide margin.

- 162 votes · 10 items
- Oct 22, 2020 · Poppy Cox
- https://even.best/en/l/1098/the-greatest-philosophers-bbc-radio-4-listeners-poll

## Top 10

1. **Karl Marx** (18 · ▲21 ▼3) — 1818-1883. Author of Capital and The Communist Manifesto; 27.9% of the vote.
2. **David Hume** (17 · ▲19 ▼2) — 1711-1776. Scottish empiricist and sceptic; 12.7%.
3. **Ludwig Wittgenstein** (15 · ▲17 ▼2) — 1889-1951. Philosophy of language: Tractatus and Philosophical Investigations; 6.8%.
4. **Friedrich Nietzsche** (13 · ▲16 ▼3) — 1844-1900. Thus Spoke Zarathustra and "God is dead"; 6.5%.
5. **Karl Popper** (11 · ▲11 ▼0) — 1902-1994. Falsifiability and The Open Society and Its Enemies; 4.2%.
6. **Socrates** (10 · ▲13 ▼3) — c. 470-399 BC. The Socratic method, known through Plato's dialogues; 4.8%.
7. **Immanuel Kant** (9 · ▲11 ▼2) — 1724-1804. Critique of Pure Reason; 5.6%.
8. **Thomas Aquinas** (8 · ▲11 ▼3) — 1225-1274. Summa Theologica, uniting Aristotle and Christian theology; 4.8%.
9. **Aristotle** (8 · ▲9 ▼1) — 384-322 BC. Logic, ethics, politics and biology; 4.5%.
10. **Plato** (5 · ▲10 ▼5) — c. 428-348 BC. The Republic and the theory of Forms; 5.7%.

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.