The greatest philosophers (BBC Radio 4 listeners' poll)
The top 3 according to 162 votes from people: Karl Marx · David Hume · Ludwig Wittgenstein. (Updated Oct 22, 2020.)
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.
Top 10
-
1
Karl Marx
1818-1883. Author of Capital and The Communist Manifesto; 27.9% of the vote.
-
2
David Hume
1711-1776. Scottish empiricist and sceptic; 12.7%.
-
3
Ludwig Wittgenstein
1889-1951. Philosophy of language: Tractatus and Philosophical Investigations; 6.8%.
-
4
Friedrich Nietzsche
1844-1900. Thus Spoke Zarathustra and "God is dead"; 6.5%.
-
5
Karl Popper
1902-1994. Falsifiability and The Open Society and Its Enemies; 4.2%.
-
6
Socrates
c. 470-399 BC. The Socratic method, known through Plato's dialogues; 4.8%.
-
7
Immanuel Kant
1724-1804. Critique of Pure Reason; 5.6%.
-
8
Thomas Aquinas
1225-1274. Summa Theologica, uniting Aristotle and Christian theology; 4.8%.
-
9
Aristotle
384-322 BC. Logic, ethics, politics and biology; 4.5%.
-
10
Plato
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.
Is something missing?
Comments (9)
Plato and Aristotle both in, the classics never die.
Popper's in, good. Falsifiability matters.
Wittgenstein in the top 3, the Tractatus fans voted.
Kant should be higher, the Critique changed everything.
Where's Descartes?? I think therefore I'm annoyed.
Marx winning says more about Radio 4 listeners in 2005 than about philosophy.
Hume at number two, very British choice, and correct.
Socrates behind Aquinas is a crime.
Nietzsche fans are very online even in 2005.