Aristotle, Plato and Alexander the Great among the personalities with the greatest global influence
Aristotle, Plato and Alexander the Great "figure out" in two separate Top 10s of the most influential people internationally.
At the top of the two related "influence lists" (which differ in their ranking methodology) are perhaps two surprises: on one side, the not widely known 18th-century Swedish naturalist Carolus Linnaeus, the "father" of modern plant and animal classification, and on the other, the clearly better-known Adolf Hitler.
Researchers from France, Italy and Spain, led by Jung-Ho Eom of the University of Toulouse and the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), ranked international personalities based on the links that appear in the approximately 31 million Wikipedia articles, which, with its editions in 287 different languages, is the largest repository of world knowledge.
The scientists treated Wikipedia as a network of articles. The more links in the network to an article, the greater the influence of the name corresponding to that entry. The number of these "incoming" links was recorded through the PageRank algorithm created by Google, and thus the first basic global ranking was obtained.
A second, more complex ranking of global influence was created using another algorithm, 2DRank, which simultaneously measures both inbound links (i.e., the references of other websites to a website about a certain personality) and outbound links (i.e., the references from a website about a certain personality to other websites).
Thus, the first top ten (based on the PageRank algorithm) consists, in order, of Carolus Linnaeus, Jesus Christ (he fell from the first place he had in 2010 in a similar ranking), Aristotle (3rd), Napoleon, Hitler, Julius Caesar, Plato (7th), Shakespeare, Einstein, and Queen Elizabeth II.
The global reach of both Aristotle and Plato is remarkable, as they are included in the top 100 in Wikipedia editions and in 24 major languages of the planet. Moreover, with a score of 2,237 "points", Aristotle is only slightly off the top (the first Linnaeus has 2,284 and the second Jesus Christ 2,282, while the fourth Napoleon has 2,208). In the English-language Wikipedia, Aristotle holds the 7th position of influence, therefore his impact is even greater in non-English-speaking countries.
It is impressive that Linnaeus is at the top of all 24 different versions of Wikipedia, as scientific nomenclature is common across different languages and ultimately many scientific terminologies are traced back to his work, so a multitude of websites refer to him.
The second top ten (based on the 2DRank algorithm) includes, in order, Hitler, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Jesus Christ, Beethoven, Mozart, Pope Benedict, Alexander the Great (8th), Darwin and Barack Obama. Alexander the Great scores 789 compared to Hitler's 1,537 and his name is included in 11 of Wikipedia's 24 editions.
Among other things, the original research shows that women lag behind men in global influence. On average, only 5% of the Top 100 celebrities based on PageRank and 10% based on 2DRank are women.
The Greek and Korean versions of Wikipedia have fewer female celebrities than the global average, while the Indian, Swedish and Hebrew versions of Wikipedia have more famous women than the global average. However, the number of prominent women has been increasing over time.
In the exclusively female ranking, the most influential PageRank list is led by Queen Elizabeth of Britain, the Virgin Mary and the oldest Queen Victoria of Britain, while in the 2DRank list the top three consists of Madonna, Queen Elizabeth and the Virgin Mary.
The Greek Wikipedia
In the Greek edition of the electronic encyclopedia, Alexander the Great is ranked as the most important person in terms of the number of citations from other websites to his name (PageRank list). The top ten is completed in order by Jesus Christ, Aristotle, Herodotus, Plato, Napoleon, Strabo, Pausanias, Hitler and Linnaeus.
Specifically, in terms of personalities from more modern political life and Greek history, we find, in order, King Otto (12), Ioannis Kapodistrias (17), Theodoros Kolokotronis (19), Eleftherios Venizelos (24), Andreas Papandreou (39), Konstantinos Karamanlis (56), Ioannis Metaxas (57), George Papandreou (83) and Charilaos Trikoupis (89).
In the second ranking 2DRank (based on incoming and outgoing website referrals), Plato is at No. 1 and the top ten is completed in order by Alexander the Great, Eleftherios Venizelos, Augustus (Roman emperor), Beethoven, Andreas Papandreou, Ioannis Kapodistrias, Plutarch, Constantine the Great and Hitler.
