People with Unusual, Minority, Culturally Atypical, or Historically Underrepresented Experiences and Worldviews Should be Overrepresented in Philosophy, Rather than Underrepresented

Saturday's post finding that only 16% of Authors in Elite Philosophy Journals Are Women brought out the misogynist bros on Twitter, but also some remarks from well-meaning people along the lines of "maybe women (ethnic minorities, etc.) just aren't that interested in philosophy".

I expressed my rejection of this perspective in a post for the Blog of the APA in 2020. Perhaps it warrants reposting:

There is nothing about philosophy, as a type of inquiry into fundamental facts about our world, that should make it more attractive to White men than to Black women. Philosophical reflection is an essential part of the human condition, of interest to people of all cultures, races, classes, and social groups. If our discipline and society were in a healthy, egalitarian condition, we should, in fact, expect people from minority groups to be overrepresented in academic philosophy, rather than underrepresented. Academic philosophy should celebrate diversity of opinion, encourage challenges to orthodoxy, and reward fresh perspectives that come from inhabiting cultures and having life experiences different from the mainstream. We should be eager, not reluctant, to hear from a wide range of voices. We should especially welcome, rather than create an inhospitable or cool environment for, people with unusual or minority or culturally atypical or historically underrepresented experiences and worldviews. The productive engine of philosophy depends on novelty and difference.

Further Reflections on the Most-Cited Works in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Underranked Works and Concentration Percentage

A couple of weeks ago, I published a list of the 253 most-cited works since 1900 in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. (The SEP had 1778 main-page entries as of my scrape last summer, and many of those entries have long reference lists.) Citation in the SEP is plausibly a better measure of impact in mainstream Anglophone philosophy than other bibliometric measures like Google Scholar and SCOPUS, which include citations by non-philosophical sources (which can dominate citations within philosophy, since philosophy is overall a relatively low-citation field) and which mix citation by sociologically elite venues with citation by less elite venues (and those citation patterns can be very different).

I think informed readers will tend to agree that the works near the top of the list (Rawls' Theory of Justice, Kripke's Naming and Necessity, etc.) are indeed among the most influential works in the mainstream Anglophone tradition -- more influential in mainstream Anglophone philosophy than, say, Foucault's Discipline and Punish or Popper's Logic of Scientific Discovery, despite Foucault's and Popper's higher citation overall across all disciplines and sources.

(What do I mean by "mainstream Anglophone philosophy"? I mean philosophy as practiced by professors in departments highly ranked in the Philosophical Gourmet Report, as published in journals that are highly ranked in Brian Leiter's polls (e.g., here), and -- though this would be circular for present purposes -- as recognized in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Even readers who dislike the philosophy of this tradition, or who see it as troublingly narrow, can I think recognize the sociological phenomenon of influence in these related ecologies, reasonably called "mainstream" in Anglophone academia.)

Underranked Works

Although SEP citation rates are, I think, a better measure of impact in mainstream Anglophone philosophy than any other existing bibliometric measure, that doesn't mean they are perfect. Works with a huge impact on a subdiscipline, or on a particular topic, will plausibly be underranked compared to works with substantial impact across a range of areas. The SEP will have only a limited number of entries for each subdiscipline or topic, and no matter how important the work is to that subdiscipline or topic, it can appear only once in each entry's bibliography.

This explains, I think, the relatively weak showings of some of the best-known articles in the field. For example:

119th (tied), 21 citations: Gettier, Edmund L., 1963, Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?

192nd (tied), 17 citations: Anscombe, G.E.M., 1958, Modern Moral Philosophy

unranked, 14 citations: Searle, John R, 1980, Minds, Brains, and Programs

unranked, 12 citations: Singer, Peter, 1972, Famine, Affluence, and Morality

unranked, 9 citations: Thomson, Judith Jarvis, 1971, A Defense of Abortion

This isn't intended as any kind of exhaustive or representative list of underranked works -- just a few examples that struck me as conspicuously underranked relative to their influence. Gettier's 1963 article is possibly the most influential work of 20th century epistemology (in mainstream Anglophone circles). Anscombe's 1958 article is often seen as a landmark in the resurgence of virtue ethics. Searle's 1980 "Chinese room" argument is perhaps the most influential work on philosophy of computation and artificial intelligence after Turing. Likewise, Singer's 1972 article on charitable donation (with its famous example of rescuing a drowning child in a nearby pond at the expense of your clothes) and Thomson's defense of abortion (with its violinist example) are known to virtually all mainstream Anglophone philosophers.

Works might also be underranked if the SEP has relatively few entries in their field or subfield. For example, I'd venture that epistemology has relatively few entries relative to its overall influence in mainstream Anglophone philosophy. And although feminism has probably been somewhat more influential in mainstream Anglophone philosophy than philosophy of race, SEP features many more entries on the former than the latter, possibly explaining why some important feminist works appear on the list (e.g., Butler's Gender Trouble at rank #61), while philosophy of race is poorly represented.

Influential authors and ideas might also fail to appear on this list, if the influence is spread among several works. For example, here are the ten most-cited authors who have no individual works represented among the top 253:

John Hawthorne (97 total citations)
Jonathan Bennett (83)
William Alston (77)
Judith Jarvis Thomson (72)
William G. Lycan (71)
Nicholas Rescher (71)
Peter Singer (71)
Ernest Sosa (69)
Jeremy Waldron (68)
Joel Feinberg (67)
Amartya Sen (67)

All of the above are among the top 86 most-cited authors born since 1900. So of course no negative inference about the importance of any individual author is justified by the absence that author's individual works from the works list.

What Percentage of an Author's Citations Are to Their Most-Cited Work?

By comparing my most-cited authors list with my most-cited works list, we can get a rough measure of how much an author's impact is concentrated in a single work vs. spread across multiple works. (Note that the lists are not quite comparable, since the authors list includes only authors born 1900 or later while the works list includes all works published 1900 or later, including works by authors born before 1900.)

Consider, for example, Thomas Kuhn. His Structure of Scientific Revolutions was one of the most influential works of philosophy of the second half of the 20th century. Fittingly, it appears 9th on my list of most influential works. But Kuhn himself appears relatively low on the list of most influential authors: 63rd. Looking at the raw numbers, we can see that 58 entries cite Structure and 71 entries cite any work by Kuhn. Thus, 82% of the Kuhn-citing entries cite Structure.

Contrast this with, say, David Lewis, who is the #1 most-cited contemporary author overall (with 307 entries citing his work) and whose most-cited work, On The Plurality of Worlds, ranks #6 (70 citing entries). For Lewis, 23% (70/307) of the entries that cite him cite his most-cited work.

I can't seem to think of a good name for this number, so I'll have to settle with a bad name: the concentration percentage. Here are the concentration percentages of the ten most-cited contemporary authors in the SEP:

1. Lewis, David K.: 23% (70/307)
2. Quine, Willard van Orman: 32% (69/213)
3. Putnam, Hilary: 24% (45/190)
4. Rawls, John: 76% (127/168)
5. Kripke, Saul A.: 58% (92/159)
6. Williamson, Timothy: 32% (48/152)
7. Davidson, Donald: 21% (31/151)
8. Williams, Bernard: 22% (32/146)
9. Nussbaum, Martha C.: 19% (26/140)
10. Nagel, Thomas: 24% (33/137)

Thus, we can see two clusters: A couple of authors had most of their citation impact through a single work: Rawls (via A Theory of Justice) and Kripke (via Naming and Necessity). The remaining authors had about a third to a fifth of their citation impact through a single work.

Among the top hundred authors, the ten most concentrated are:

Kuhn, Thomas S. (82%: Structure of Scientific Revolutions)
Rawls, John (76%: A Theory of Justice)
Parfit, Derek (71%: Reasons and Persons)
Scanlon, Thomas M. (66%: What We Owe to Each Other)
Kaplan, David (65%: Demonstratives)
Ryle, Gilbert (61%: The Concept of Mind)
Kripke, Saul A. (58%: Naming and Necessity)
Ayer, Alfred J. (54%: Language, Truth, and Logic)
Nozick, Robert (53%: Anarchy, State, and Utopia)
Evans, Gareth (53%: Varieties of Reference)

I confess to being surprised that some of these percentages aren't even higher. For example, I'd have guessed Ryle's impact was more than 61% concentrated on The Concept of Mind.

The ten least concentrated are:

Bennett, Jonathan (16%)
Pettit, Philip (16%)
Harman, Gilbert H. (16%)
Hawthorne, John (15%)
Thomson, Judith Jarvis (15%)
Lowe, E. J. (15%)
Waldron, Jeremy (15%)
Feinberg, Joel (13%)
Yablo, Stephen (13%)
Rescher, Nicholas (6%)

I'll venture a prediction. According to the phenomenon I've labeled "The Winnowing of Greats", the greater your distance from a group that varies in eminence, the greater the difference seems between the most eminent members of that group and the less eminent members. (This is to some extent because you have zero knowledge of most members below a certain level of eminence and to some extent because you overrely on second-hand summaries that highlight a few of the most eminent examples.) If this winnowing phenomenon applies to works as well as to authors, then as time creates distance from our era, all but the most influential works will largely be forgotten -- which will disproportionately favor highly concentrated authors in the historical memory.

[click image to enlarge and clarify]

The Gender and Race/Ethnicity of Authors of the Most-Cited Works of Mainstream Anglophone Philosophy

As is well-known, mainstream Anglophone philosophy has tended to be overwhelmingly non-Hispanic White -- though there's some evidence of recent changes in the student population which might start to trickle into the professoriate. Generally, the higher the level of prestige, the more skewed the ratios. In my 2024 analysis of the 376 most-cited authors in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, I found that women or nonbinary authors constituted 12% of the list and Hispanic or non-White authors constituted 3%.

How well represented are these groups among authors of the 253 most-cited works in the Stanford Encyclopedia? Here, the skew is even more extreme. Of the 265 included work-author combinations (almost all of the included works are solo-authored), I count 24 works (9%) by women, 2 (1%) non-binary authored works (both by Judith Butler), one (0.4%) by a Hispanic/Latino person (Linda Martín Alcoff), one (0.4%) by an Asian (Jaegwon Kim), and none by any authors that are known by me to identify or be perceived as Black or African American, American Indian / Alaska Native, or Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (using the race/ethnicity categories of the US Census). Corrections welcome if I'm misclassified anyone!

Here it is as a pie chart. If you squint, you might be able to see the lines for the Hispanic or non-White groups.

[pie chart comparing 236 non-Hispanic White men with 25 non-Hispanic White women or nonbinary, 1 Hispanic or non-White man, and 1 Hispanic or non-White woman or nonbinary]

The 253 Most Cited Works in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Last summer, Jordan Jackson and I scraped the bibliographies of all the main-page entries of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the leading source of review articles in mainstream Anglophone philosophy. Since 2010, I've been analyzing citation patterns in the SEP. Generally, I find SEP citation rates to more plausibly measure influence in mainstream Anglophone philosophy than other bibliometric measures, such those derived from Web of Science or Google Scholar. (For example, by the SEP method the top five most cited philosophers born 1900 or later are David Lewis, W.V.O. Quine, Hilary Putnam, John Rawls, and Saul Kripke.)

Most of my SEP-based analyses aggregate by author, but it's also revealing to aggregate by work cited, for a couple of reasons. First, my author-based analyses probably overstate the influence of authors with moderate impact across many fields compared to authors with transformative impact in just one or a few fields. Second, tracking influential works is an interesting project in its own right.

Before proceeding to the list, notes and caveats.

(1.) Each work counts once per main-page bibliographic entry in the SEP. Thus, a work with a total of 33 is cited in 33 different main page entries. Subpage entries are not included.

(2.) What counts as the "same work"? The distinction admits vague and contentious cases, and implementing it mechanically raises further problems. Here's what I did: To count as the same work, the work had to begin with exactly the same title words (excluding punctuation marks, "a", "an", or "the"). Later editions were counted as the same work as earlier editions (including a few cases of "such-and-such revisited" or the like) and articles republished in collections were counted as the same work if the particular article rather than the collection as a whole was cited. Also, works that appeared first as articles then later were expanded into books with the same or similar title were counted as the same work. Multi-volume works counted as the same work, unless the title was "Complete Works" or similar.

(3.) I only included works with publication dates from 1900-2024. Older works tend not to be cited in a consistent, easily scraped format, so results for those works are inaccurate and potentially misleading.

(4.) I did not attempt to match works cited both in English and in their original language. Some translated works make the list simply in virtue of citation under their English-language title; and some untranslated works make the list simply in virtue of citation under their original-language title. Obviously, this systematically undercounts works that are cited under both their English and original-language titles.

(4.) Citations in the role of editor are not included.

(5.) Please excuse the haphazard cut-and-paste formatting. Dates are sometimes first appearance, sometimes later appearance or edition or translation.

(6.) Technical details: The matching algorithm looked for matches in the first four letters of the author's name and the first five letters of the first text appearing after numbers, punctuation marks, "the", "an", or "a", which for standardly formatted entries is the title. I then alphabetically sorted and hand-checked all bibliographic lines with at least 15 exact matches of both of the two parameters. This took several hours and was probably imperfect, but was not as difficult as it might seem. Note also: The scrape was conducted last summer, so recent entries and recent updates won't figure into the totals.

(7.) Corrections welcome, as long as they are consistent with the principles above and don't constitute a general revision, unsystematically applied on one author's behalf, of the method described in the technical details.

(8.) I'll follow up, probably in the next week or two, with some reflections on the list.

(9.) You can see the 2020 results here.

ETA Apr 9: Two follow-up posts:

The Gender and Race/Ethnicity of Authors of the Most-Cited Works of Mainstream Anglophone Philosophy (Mar 31)

Further Reflections on the Most-Cited Works in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Underranked Works and Concentration Percentage (Apr 8)

[cover of Rawls's A Theory of Justice]

1. (127 citing entries) Rawls, John, 1971, A Theory of Justice
2. (92) Kripke, Saul, 1972, Naming and Necessity
3. (79) Parfit, Derek, 1984, Reasons and Persons
4. (72) Nozick, Robert, 1974, Anarchy, State, and Utopia
5. (71) Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 1953 [2001], Philosophical Investigations
6. (70) Lewis, David, 1986, On the Plurality of Worlds
7. (69) Quine, W. V. O., 1960. Word and Object
8. (67) Scanlon, T. M., 1998, What We Owe to Each Other
9. (58) Kuhn, Thomas S., 1962, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
10. (57) Rawls, John, 1996, Political Liberalism
11. (54) Chalmers, David J., 1996, The Conscious Mind
12. (49) Russell, Betrand, 1903, The Principles of Mathematics
13. (48) Lewis, David, 1973. Counterfactuals
13. (48) Sidgwick, Henry, 1907, The Methods of Ethics
13. (48) Williamson, Timothy, 2000, Knowledge and its Limits
16. (47) Kaplan, David, 1977, Demonstratives
16. (47) Moore, G.E., 1903, Principia Ethica
18. (45) Putnam, Hilary, 1975, The Meaning of "Meaning"
18. (45) Quine, W.V.O., 1951, Two Dogmas of Empiricism
20. (43) Jackson, Frank, 1998, From Metaphysics to Ethics
21. (41) Ayer, A.J., 1936, Language, Truth and Logic
22. (39) Carnap, Rudolf, 1956, Meaning and necessity
22. (39) Ross, W.D., 1931, The Right and the Good
22. (39) Ryle, Gilbert, 1949. The Concept of Mind
22. (39) van Fraassen, Bas C., 1980, The Scientific Image
26. (37) Dummett, Michael, 1973, Frege: Philosophy of Language
26. (37) Evans, Gareth, 1982, The Varieties of Reference
26. (37) Mackie, J. L., 1977, Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong
26. (37) Russell, Bertrand, 1905, On Denoting
26. (37) Whitehead, Alfred North and Bertrand Russell, 1910-1913, Principia Mathematica
31. (36) Goodman, Nelson, 1954. Fact, Fiction and Forecast
32. (35) Popper, Karl R., 1959, The Logic of Scientific Discovery
32. (35) Wittgenstein, L., 1922, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
34. (34) Fodor, Jerry A., 1987, Psychosemantics
34. (34) Korsgaard, Christine M., 1996, Sources of Normativity
34. (34) Lewis, David K., 1969, Convention: A Philosophical Study
34. (34) Nozick, Robert, 1981, Philosophical Explanations
34. (34) Raz, Joseph, 1986, The Morality of Freedom
34. (34) Woodward, James, 2003, Making Things Happen
40. (33) Gauthier, David, 1986, Morals by Agreement
40. (33) McDowell, John, 1994, Mind and World
40. (33) Nagel, Thomas, 1986, The View from Nowhere
40. (33) Russell, Bertrand, 1912, The Problems of Philosophy
44. (32) Parfit, Derek, 2017, On What Matters
44. (32) Williams, Bernard, 1985, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy
46. (31) Davidson, Donald, 1980, Essays on Actions and Events
46. (31) Gibbard, Allan, 1990, Wise Choices, Apt Feelings
46. (31) Strawson, P.F., 1959. Individuals
49. (29) Finnis, John. M, 1980, Natural Law and Natural Rights
49. (29) Fricker, Miranda, 2007, Epistemic Injustice
49. (29) Longino, Helen E., 1990, Science as Social Knowledge
52. (28) Anscombe, G. E. M., 1957, Intention
52. (28) Brandom, Robert B., 1994, Making It Explicit
52. (28) Jackson, Frank, 1982, Epiphenomenal Qualia
52. (28) Pearl, Judea, 2000, Causality: Models, Reasoning, and Inference
52. (28) Plantinga, Alvin, 1974, The Nature of Necessity
52. (28) Quine, W. V. O., 1948, On What There Is
52. (28) Rawls, John, 2001, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement
52. (28) Sellars, Wilfrid, 1956, Empiricism and the philosophy of mind
52. (28) van Inwagen, Peter, 1990, Material Beings
61. (27) Armstrong, David M., 1997, A World of States of Affairs
61. (27) Butler, Judith, 1990, Gender Trouble
61. (27) Dennett, Daniel C., 1991, Consciousness Explained
61. (27) Dretske, Fred I., 1981, Knowledge and the Flow of Information
61. (27) Hare, R.M., 1952, The Language of Morals
61. (27) Lewis, David, 1983, New Work for a Theory of Universals
61. (27) Millikan, Ruth Garrett, 1984, Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories
61. (27) Nagel, Thomas, 1974, What is It Like to Be a Bat?
61. (27) Smith, Michael, 1994, The Moral Problem
61. (27) Young, Iris Marion, 1990, Justice and the Politics of Difference
71. (26) Carnap, Rudolf, 1950, Logical Foundations of Probability
71. (26) Frankfurt, Harry, 1971, Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person
71. (26) Grice, Herbert Paul, 1989, Studies in the Way of Words
71. (26) Jeffrey, Richard C., 1965 [1983], The Logic of Decision
71. (26) Kripke, Saul, 1982, Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
71. (26) Nussbaum, Martha C., 2006, Frontiers of Justice
71. (26) Searle, John R., 1983, Intentionality
78. (25) Anderson, Elizabeth S., 1999, What Is the Point of Equality?
78. (25) Armstrong, David M., 1968, A Materialist Theory of Mind
78. (25) Dworkin, Ronald, 1977, Taking Rights Seriously
78. (25) Fodor, Jerry A., 1975, The Language of Thought
78. (25) Hart, H.L.A., 1961, The Concept of Law
78. (25) Hempel, Carl G., 1965, Aspects of Scientific Explanation
78. (25) Kneale, William and Martha Kneale, 1962. The Development of Logic
78. (25) MacIntyre, Alasdair, 1984. After Virtue
78. (25) Nagel, Ernest, 1961, The Structure of Science
78. (25) Ramsey, Frank P., 1931, Truth and Probability
78. (25) Rawls, John, 1999, The Law of Peoples
78. (25) Russell, Bertrand, 1918/1919, The Philosophy of Logical Atomism
78. (25) Stalnaker, Robert, 1984, Inquiry
78. (25) Williamson, Timothy, 2007, The Philosophy of Philosophy
92. (24) Blackburn, Simon, 1998, Ruling Passions
92. (24) Brink, David O., 1989. Moral Realism and the Foundations of Ethics
92. (24) Burge, Tyler, 1979, Individualism and the Mental
92. (24) Dupré, John, 1993, The Disorder of Things
92. (24) Fine, Kit, 1994, Essence and Modality
92. (24) Hare, R.M., 1981, Moral Thinking
92. (24) Lewis, D., 1986, Philosophical Papers
92. (24) Quine, W. V. O., 1970, Philosophy of Logic
100. (23) Carnap, Rudolf, 1950, Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology
100. (23) Cartwright, Nancy, 1983, How the laws of physics lie
100. (23) Gilligan, Carol, 1982, In a Different Voice
100. (23) Griffin, James, 1986, Well-Being: its Meaning, Measurement, and Moral Importance
100. (23) Kitcher, Philip, 1993, The Advancement of Science
100. (23) Putnam, Hilary, 1981, Reason, Truth and History
100. (23) Savage, Leonard J., 1954, The Foundations of Statistics
100. (23) Searle, John R., 1969, Speech Acts
100. (23) Shafer-Landau, Russ, 2005, Moral Realism
100. (23) Spirtes, Peter, Clark Glymour, and Richard Scheines, 1993, Causation, Prediction, and Search
100. (23) Stalnaker, Robert C., 1968, A Theory of Conditionals
100. (23) Turing, Alan M., 1936 [1965], On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem
112. (22) Davidson, Donald, 1963. Actions, Reasons, Causes
112. (22) Dretske, Fred, 1995, Naturalizing the Mind
112. (22) Fodor, Jerry A., 1983, Modularity of Mind
112. (22) Machamer, Peter, Lindley Darden, and Carl F. Craver, 2000, Thinking about Mechanisms
112. (22) Street, Sharon, 2006, A Darwinian Dilemma for Realist Theories of Value
112. (22) van Fraassen, Bas C., 1989, Laws and Symmetry
112. (22) Zalta, Edward N., 1983, Abstract Objects
119. (21) Alcoff, Linda Martin, 2006. Visible Identities
119. (21) Brandt, Richard B., 1979, A Theory of the Good and the Right
119. (21) Cartwright, Nancy, 1999, The Dappled World
119. (21) Dawkins, Richard, 1976, The Selfish Gene
119. (21) Dworkin, Ronald, 1986, Law's Empire,
119. (21) Field, Hartry, 1989, Realism, Mathematics and Modality
119. (21) Fodor, Jerry A., 1974, Special Sciences (or: The Disunity of Science as a Working Hypothesis)
119. (21) Gettier, Edmund L., 1963, Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?
119. (21) Longino, H. 2001, The Fate of Knowledge
119. (21) Nussbaum, Martha C., 2000. Women and Human Development
119. (21) Okin, Susan Moller, 1989, Justice, Gender, and the Family
119. (21) Sober, Elliott and David Wilson, 1998, Unto Others
119. (21) Strawson, Peter F., 1962, Freedom and Resentment
119. (21) Tye, Michael, 1995, Ten Problems of Consciousness
119. (21) Walzer, Michael, 1983, Spheres of Justice
119. (21) Wiggins, David, 1980, Sameness and Substance
135. (20) Austin, J.L., 1962, How to Do Things with Words
135. (20) Chisholm, Roderick M., 1957, Perceiving
135. (20) Dancy, Jonathan, 2004, Ethics Without Principles
135. (20) Darwall, Stephen, 2006. The Second-Person Standpoint
135. (20) Davidson, Donald, 1984, Inquiries into truth and interpretation
135. (20) Dennett, Daniel C., 1987, The Intentional Stance
135. (20) Dworkin, Ronald, 2000. Sovereign Virtue
135. (20) Feyerabend, Paul K., 1975, Against Method
135. (20) Gödel, Kurt, 1931, Über formal unentscheidbare Sätze der Principia Mathematica und verwandter Systeme I
135. (20) Husserl, Edmund, 1900-01, Logische Untersuchungen
135. (20) Quine, Willard Van Orman, 1953, From A Logical Point of View
135. (20) Reichenbach, Hans, 1938, Experience and Prediction
135. (20) Rorty, Richard, 1979, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature
135. (20) Rosen, Gideon, 2010, Metaphysical Dependence
135. (20) Wright, Crispin, 1983, Frege's Conception of Numbers as Objects
135. (20) Zalta, Edward N., 1988, Intensional Logic and the Metaphysics of Intentionality
151. (19) Anderson, Alan and Nuel Belnap, 1975, Entailment: The logic of relevance and necessity
151. (19) Blackburn, Simon, 1984. Spreading the Word
151. (19) Blackburn, Simon, 1993, Essays in Quasi-Realism
151. (19) Chisholm, Roderick M., 1976, Person and Object
151. (19) Craver, Carl F., 2007, Explaining the Brain
151. (19) Fischer, John Martin and Ravizza, Mark, 1998. Responsibility and Control
151. (19) Grice, H. P., 1975, Logic and Conversation
151. (19) Hintikka, Jaakko, 1962, Knowledge and Belief
151. (19) Keynes, John Maynard, 1921, A Treatise on Probability
151. (19) Lewis, David, 1979, Attitudes De Dicto and De Se
151. (19) Parsons, Terence, 1980, Nonexistent Objects
151. (19) Pogge, Thomas, 2002 [2008], World Poverty and Human Rights
151. (19) Priest, Graham, 1987, In Contradiction
151. (19) Salmon, Nathan, 1986, Frege's Puzzle
151. (19) Sider, Theodore, 2001, Four-Dimensionalism
151. (19) Tarski, A., 1983, Logic, Semantics, Metamathematics
151. (19) Thomasson, Amie L., 1999, Fiction and Metaphysics
151. (19) Williamson, Timothy, 2013. Modal Logic as Metaphysics
169. (18) Armstrong, D., 1989, Universals: An Opinionated Introduction
169. (18) Barnes, Jonathan, 1982, The Presocratic Philosophers
169. (18) Chisholm, Roderick M., 1966, Theory of Knowledge
169. (18) Fodor, J., 1992, A Theory of Content and Other Essays
169. (18) Gibbard, Allan, 2003, Thinking How to Live
169. (18) Goodman, Nelson, 1968, Languages of Art
169. (18) Hacking, Ian, 1983, Representing and Intervening
169. (18) Harman, Gilbert, 1986, Change in View
169. (18) Hilbert, David and Wilhelm Ackermann, 1928, Grundzüge der Theoretischen Logik
169. (18) Kahneman, Daniel, 2011, Thinking, Fast and Slow
169. (18) Kittay, Eva Feder, 1999, Love's Labor
169. (18) Lewis, David K., 1991, Parts of Classes
169. (18) Lewis, David, 1973, Causation
169. (18) Moore, G. E., 1912. Ethics
169. (18) Noë, Alva, 2004, Action in Perception
169. (18) Prior, Arthur N., 1967, Past, Present and Future
169. (18) Salmon, Wesley, 1984, Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World
169. (18) Schaffer, Jonathan, 2009, On What Grounds What
169. (18) Searle, John R., 1992, The Rediscovery of the Mind
169. (18) Stich, Stephen P., 1983, From folk psychology to cognitive science
169. (18) Taylor, Charles, 1989, Sources of the Self
169. (18) Walton, Kendall, 1990, Mimesis as Make-Believe
169. (18) Wright, Crispin, 1992, Truth and Objectivity
192. (17) Annas, Julia, 1993, The Morality of Happiness
192. (17) Anscombe, G.E.M., 1958, Modern Moral Philosophy
192. (17) Benacerraf, Paul, 1973, Mathematical Truth
192. (17) Carnap, Rudolf, 1928. Der logische Aufbau der Welt
192. (17) Davidson, Donald, 1970, Mental Events
192. (17) Dretske, Fred, 1988, Explaining behavior
192. (17) Field, Hartry, 1980, Science Without Numbers
192. (17) Goldman, Alvin, 1979, What is Justified Belief?
192. (17) Graham, Angus C., 1989, Disputers of the Tao
192. (17) Grice, H. P., 1957, Meaning
192. (17) Guthrie, W.K.C., 1962-1981, A History of Greek Philosophy
192. (17) Hooker, Brad, 2000, Ideal Code, Real World
192. (17) Howson, Colin and Peter Urbach, 2006, Scientific Reasoning
192. (17) Hull, David L., 1988, Science as a Process
192. (17) Kagan, Shelly, 1989, The Limits of Morality
192. (17) Kim, Jaegwon, 1998, Mind in a Physical World
192. (17) Kleene, Stephen Cole, 1952, Introduction to Metamathematics
192. (17) Lewis, David, 1980, A Subjectivist's Guide to Objective Chance
192. (17) List, Christian and Philip Pettit, 2011, Group Agency
192. (17) MacKinnon, Catherine, 1989, Towards a Feminist Theory of the State
192. (17) Marr, David, 1982, Vision
192. (17) Peacocke, Christopher, 1992, A Study of Concepts
192. (17) Plantinga, Alvin, 2000, Warranted Christian Belief
192. (17) Ross, W.D., 1939, Foundations of Ethics
192. (17) Russell, B., 1914, Our Knowledge of the External World
192. (17) Schneewind, J. B., 1998. The Invention of Autonomy
192. (17) Tarski, Alfred, 1935, The Concept of Truth in Formalized Languages
192. (17) van Inwagen, Peter, 1983. An Essay on Free Will
192. (17) Von Neumann, John and Oskar Morgenstern, 1944, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior
221. (16) Adams, Robert Merrihew, 1994, Leibniz
221. (16) Armstrong, D. M., 1978, Universals and Scientific Realism
221. (16) Axelrod, Robert and William D. Hamilton, 1981, The Evolution of Cooperation
221. (16) Butler, Judith, 1993. Bodies That Matter
221. (16) Churchland, Paul M., 1981, Eliminative materialism and the propositional attitudes
221. (16) Clark, Andy and David J. Chalmers, 1998, The Extended Mind
221. (16) Dummett, Michael, 1991, The Logical Basis of Metaphysics
221. (16) Fine, Kit, 2001, The Question of Realism
221. (16) Frankfurt, Harry, 1988. The Importance of What We Care About
221. (16) Frege, Gottlob, 1918/1956, The Thought: A Logical Inquiry
221. (16) Geach, Peter, 1962, Reference and Generality
221. (16) Gödel, Kurt, 1944, Russell's Mathematical Logic
221. (16) Hare, R. M., 1963. Freedom and Reason
221. (16) Horgan, Terence and John Tienson, 2002, The Intentionality of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Intentionality
221. (16) Irwin, Terence. H., 2008, The Development of Ethics
221. (16) Joyce, James M., 1999, The Foundations of Causal Decision Theory
221. (16) Kane, Robert, 1996, The Significance of Free Will
221. (16) Lipton, Peter, 1971 [2003], Inference to the Best Explanation
221. (16) Lloyd, Genevieve, 1984, The Man of Reason
221. (16) McMahan, Jeff, 2002, The Ethics of Killing
221. (16) Mellor, D.H., 1981, Real Time
221. (16) Perry, John, 1979, The Problem of the Essential Indexical
221. (16) Popper, Karl, 1962. Conjectures and refutations
221. (16) Raz, J., 1990. Practical reason and norms
221. (16) Russell, Bertrand, 1927, The Analysis of Matter
221. (16) Sandel, Michael J., 1982. Liberalism and the Limits of Justice
221. (16) Scheffler, Samuel, 1982, The Rejection of Consequentialism
221. (16) Stalnaker, Robert, 1978, Assertion
221. (16) Stevenson, Charles L., 1944, Ethics and Language
221. (16) Swinburne, Richard, 1977, The Coherence of Theism
221. (16) Tye, Michael, 2000, Consciousness, Color, and Content
221. (16) Williams, Bernard, 1981, Moral Luck
221. (16) Williams, George C., 1966, Adaptation and Natural Selection

Age and Philosophical Fame in the Early Twentieth Century

In previous work, I've found that eminent philosophers tend to do their most influential work when they are in their 40s (though the age range has a wider spread than eminent scientists, who rarely do their most influential work in their 50s or later).  I have also found some data suggesting that philosophers tend to be discussed most when they are about age 55-70, well after they produce their most influential work.  It seems to take about 15-20 years, on average, for a philosopher's full import to be felt by the field.

I was curious to see if the pattern holds for philosophers born 1850-1899, whom we can examine systematically using the new Edhiphy tool.  (Edhiphy captures mentions of philosophers' names in articles in leading philosophy journals, 1890-1980.)

Here's what I did:

First, I had Edhiphy output the top-50 most-mentioned philosophers from 1890-1980, limited to philosophers with recorded birthyear from 1850-1899.[1]  For each philosopher, I went to their Ediphy profile and had Edhiphy output a graph showing the number of articles in which that philosopher was cited per year.  For example, here's the graph for George Santayana (1863-1952):

[Articles mentioning George Santayana per year, in a few selected philosophy journals, per Edhiphy; click to enlarge and clarify]

I then recorded the peak year for each philosopher (1928 for Santayana).  As you can see, the display is a little visually confusing, so it's possible that in some cases my estimate was off by a year.

One complication is that there are many more total mentions of philosophers in the later decades than the earlier decades -- partly due to more articles in the database for later decades, but probably also partly due to changes in citation practices.  Still, most authors (like Santayana) show enough decline over time that late citations don't swamp their first peak.  So instead of trying to introduce a systematic adjustment to discount later mentions I simply recorded the raw peak.  For the thirteen philosophers with more than one equal-valued peak, I took the earlier year (e.g., John Dewey was mentioned in 48 articles in both 1940 and 1951, so I treated 1940 as his peak).

In accord with previous work, I found that philosophers' peak discussion tended to occur late in life.  The median age at peak discussion was 67.5 (mean 68.8).

Four outliers peaked over age 100: David Hilbert (112), Pierre Duhem (114), Giuseppe Peano (116), and Karl Pearson (121).  However, it's probably fair to say that none of these four was primarily known as a philosopher in their lifetimes: Hilbert, Peano, and Pearson were mathematicians and Duhem a physicist.  Almost everyone else on the list is primarily known as a philosopher, so these four are not representative.  Excluding these outliers, the median is 66.5 and mean is 64.7, and no one peaked after age 90.

Three philosophers peaked by age 40: Ralph Barton Perry (peaked at age 35 in 1911), C. D. Broad (peaked at age 40 in 1927), and William Pepperell Montague (peaked at age 40 in 1913).  Broad's early peak -- as you can see from the graph below -- is due to an outlier year, without which his peak would have been much later.  On the other hand, given the overall increase in mentions over time, we should probably be discounting the later decades anyway.

[Edhiphy citations of C.D. Broad; click to enlarge and clarify]

Six philosophers peaked age 44 to 49; five peaked in their 50s; 14 in their 60s; 10 in their 70s; and 8 in their 80s.

You might wonder whether the philosophers who peaked late also produced their most influential work late.  There is a trend in this direction.  Hans Reichenbach, who peaked in 1978 at age 87, produced his most cited work in 1938 (at age 47).  L. J. Russell, who peaked in 1970 at age 86, appears to have produced his most cited work in 1942 (at age 58).  Edmund Husserl, who peaked in 1941 at age 82, produced his most cited work in 1913 (at age 54)  John Dewey, who peaked in 1940 at age 81, produced his most cited work in 1916 (at age 57).  Ernst Cassirer, who peaked in 1955 at age 81 produced his most-cited work in 1944 (at age 70).  Still, for all but Cassirer the delay between most-cited work and peak discussion is over 20 years.

A similar spread occurs in the middle of the pack.  The five philosophers with peak citation at median ages 67-68 (the median age of peak citation for the group as a whole) produced their most-cited works at ages 30 (Karl Japsers), 42 (J. M. E. McTaggart), 45 (C. I. Lewis), 49 (Max Scheler), and 61 (Samuel Alexander).  For this group too, the typical delay between most-cited work and peak citation is about twenty years.

Although the peak age is a little later than I would have predicted based on earlier work, overall I'd say the data for early twentieth century philosophers tends to confirm trends I found in my earlier work on mid-to-late twentieth-century philosophers.  Specifically:

(1.) Philosophers produce their most influential work at a wide range of ages, but mid-40s is typical.

(2.) The peak rates of discussion of philosophers' work tends to come late in life, typically decades after they have published their most influential work.

Articles mentioning JME McTaggart, by year 1890-1980 in Edhiphy.  Note peak in the late 1930s. McTaggart's most influential publication was in 1908.

------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Edhiphy has a few peculiar gaps in birthyear data.  By far the most conspicuous are Gottlob Frege (born 1848) and Albert Einstein (1879).  However, Frege is outside my target period, and Einstein is not primarily known as a philosopher, so this shouldn't much distort the results.  Several figures with missing birthdates are psychologists (Scripture, Binet, Hering) or physicists (Bridgman, Maxwell).  H. A. Prichard is perhaps the most discussed straight philosopher born in the period whose birthdate is not recorded in Ediphy.

Philosophical Fame, 1890-1960

There's a fun new tool at Edhiphy. The designers pulled the full text from twelve leading philosophy journals from 1890 to 1980 and counted the occurrences of philosophers' names. (See note [1] for discussion of error rates in their method.)

Back in the early 2010s, I posted several bibliometric studies of philosophers' citation or discussion rates over time, mostly based on searches of Philosopher's Index abstracts from 1940 to the present. This new tool gives me a chance to update some of my thinking, using a different method and going further into the past.

One thing I found fascinating in my earlier studies was how some philosophers who used to be huge (for example, Henri Bergson and Herbert Spencer) are now hardly read, while others (for example, Gottlob Frege) have had more staying power.

Let's look at the top 25 most discussed philosophers from each available decade.

1890s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
3. Aristotle
4. David Hume
5. Herbert Spencer
6. William James
7. Plato
8. John Stuart Mill
9. René Descartes
10. Wilhelm Wundt
11. Hermann Lotze
12. F. H. Bradley
13. Charles Sanders Peirce
14. Buddha
15. Thomas Hill Green
16. Benedictus de Spinoza
17. Charles Darwin
18. John Locke
19. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
20. Thomas Hobbes
21. Arthur Schopenhauer
22. Socrates
23. Hermann von Helmholtz
24. George Frederick Stout
25. Alexander Bain

Notes:

Only three of the twelve journals existed in the 1890s, so this is a small sample.

Philosophy and empirical psychology were not clearly differentiated as disciplines until approximately the 1910s or 1920s, and these journals covered both areas. (For example, the Journal of Philosophy was originally founded in 1904 as the Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, shortening to the now familiar name in 1921.) Although Wundt, Helmholtz, and Stout were to some extent philosophers, they are probably better understood primarily as early psychologists. William James is of course famously claimed by both fields.

Herbert Spencer, as previously noted, was hugely influential in his day: fifth on this eminent list! Another eminent philosopher on this list (#11) who is hardly known today (at least in mainstream Anglophone circles) is Hermann Lotze.

Most of the others on the list are historical giants, plus some prominent British idealists (F. H. Bradley, Thomas Hill Green) and pragmatists (William James, Charles Sanders Peirce, Alexander Bain) and interestingly (but not representative of later decades) "Buddha". (A spot check reveals that some of these references are to Gautama Buddha or "the Buddha", while others use "buddha" in a more general sense.)

1900s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. William James
3. Plato
4. F. H. Bradley
5. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
6. David Hume
7. Aristotle
8. Herbert Spencer
9. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
10. John Dewey
11. George Berkeley
12. John Stuart Mill
13. George Frederick Stout
14. Thomas Hill Green
15. Josiah Royce
16. Benedictus de Spinoza
17. John Locke
18. Ferdinand Canning Scott Schiller
19. Ernst Mach
20. Wilhelm Wundt
21. James Ward
22. René Descartes
23. Alfred Edward Taylor
24. Henry Sidgwick
25. Bertrand Russell

Notes:

Notice the fast rise of John Dewey (1859-1952), to #10 (#52 in the 1890s list). Other living philosophers in the top ten were James (1842-1910), Bradley (1846-1824), and for part of the period Spencer (1820-1903).

It's also striking to see George Berkeley enter the list so high (#11, compared to #28 in the 1890s) and Descartes fall so fast despite his continuing importance later (from #9 to #22). This could be statistical noise due to the small number of journals, or it could reflect historical trends. I'm not sure.

Our first "analytic" philosopher appears: Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) at #25. He turned 33 in 1905, so he found eminence very young for a philosopher.

Lotze has already fallen off the list (#29 in the 1900s; #29 in the 1910s; #63 in the 1930s, afterwards not in the top 100).

1910s:

1. Henri Bergson
2. Bertrand Russell
3. Immanuel Kant
4. Plato
5. William James
6. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
7. Aristotle
8. Socrates
9. Bernard Bosanquet
10. George Berkeley
11. F. H. Bradley
12. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
13. René Descartes
14. Josiah Royce
15. David Hume
16. Isaac Newton
17. John Dewey
18. Friedrich Nietzsche
19. Ferdinand Canning Scott Schiller
20. Arthur Schopenhauer
21. John Locke
22. Benedictus de Spinoza
23. Edwin Holt
24. Isaac Barrow
25. Johann Gottlieb Fichte

Notes:

Henri Bergson (1859-1941) debuts at #1! What a rock star. (He was #63 in the 1900s list.) We forget how huge he was in his day. Russell, who so far has had much more durable influence, rockets up to #2. It's also interesting to see Bernard Bosanquet (1848-1923), who is now little read in mainstream Anglophone circles, at #9.

Josiah Royce is also highly mentioned in this era (#14 in this list, #15 in the 1900s list), despite not being much read now. F.C.S. Schiller (1864-1937) is a similar case (#19 in this list, #18 in the 1900s list).

1920s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. Plato
3. Aristotle
4. Bernard Bosanquet
5. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
6. F. H. Bradley
7. Bertrand Russell
8. Benedictus de Spinoza
9. William James
10. Socrates
11. John Dewey
12. Alfred North Whitehead
13. David Hume
14. George Santayana
15. René Descartes
16. Henri Bergson
17. Albert Einstein
18. C. D. Broad
19. John Locke
20. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
21. George Berkeley
22. Isaac Newton
23. James Ward
24. Samuel Alexander
25. Benedetto Croce

Notes:

I'm struck by how the 1920s returns to the classics at the top of the list, with Kant, Plato, and Aristotle as #1, #2, and #3. Bergson is already down to #16 and Russell has slipped to #7. Most surprising to me, though, is Bosanquet at #4! What?!

1930s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. Plato
3. Aristotle
4. Benedictus de Spinoza
5. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
6. René Descartes
7. Alfred North Whitehead
8. Bertrand Russell
9. David Hume
10. John Locke
11. George Berkeley
12. Socrates
13. Friedrich Nietzsche
14. Rudolf Carnap
15. William James
16. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
17. John Dewey
18. Isaac Newton
19. Clarence Irving Lewis
20. Arthur Oncken Lovejoy
21. Albert Einstein
22. Charles Sanders Peirce
23. F. H. Bradley
24. Ludwig Wittgenstein
25. Bernard Bosanquet

Notes:

Nietzsche rises suddenly (#13; vs #56 in the 1920s list). Wittgenstein also cracks the list at #24 (not even in the top 100 in the 1920s).

With the exception of Whitehead, top of the list looks like what early 21st century mainstream Anglophone philosophers tend to perceive as the most influential figures in pre-20th-century Western philosophy (see, e.g., Brian Leiter's 2017 poll). The 1930s, perhaps, were for whatever reason a decade more focused on the history of philosophy than on leading contemporary thinkers. (The presence of historian of ideas Arthur Lovejoy [1873-1962] at #20 further reinforces that thought.)

1940s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. Alfred North Whitehead
3. Aristotle
4. Plato
5. Bertrand Russell
6. John Dewey
7. David Hume
8. William James
9. George Berkeley
10. Charles Sanders Peirce
11. René Descartes
12. Benedictus de Spinoza
13. Edmund Husserl
14. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
15. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
16. Thomas Aquinas
17. Socrates
18. Rudolf Carnap
19. Martin Heidegger
20. G. E. Moore
21. John Stuart Mill
22. Isaac Newton
23. Søren Kierkegaard
24. A. J. Ayer
25. John Locke

Notes:

Oh, how people loved Whitehead (#2) in the 1940s!

Edmund Husserl (1859-1938) makes a posthumous appearance at #13 (#31 in the 1920s) and Heidegger (1889-1976) at #19 (#97 in the 1920s), suggesting an impact of Continental phenomenology. I suspect this is due to the inclusion of Philosophy and Phenomenological Research in the database starting 1940. Although the journal is now a bastion of mainstream Anglophone philosophy, in its early decades it included lots of work in Continental phenomenology (as the journal's title suggests).

The philosophers we now think of as the big three American pragmatists have a very strong showing in the 1940s, with Dewey at #6, James at #8, and Peirce at #10.

Thomas Aquinas makes his first and only showing (at #16), suggesting that Catholic philosophy is having more of an impact in this era.

We're also starting to see more analytic philosophers, with G. E. Moore (1873-1958), and A. J. Ayer (1910-1989) now making the list, in addition to Russell and Carnap (1891-1970).

Wittgenstein, surprisingly to me, has fallen off the list all the way down to #73 -- perhaps suggesting that if he hadn't had his second era, his earlier work would have been quickly forgotten.

1950s:

1. Immanuel Kant
2. Plato
3. Aristotle
4. Bertrand Russell
5. David Hume
6. Gilbert Ryle
7. G. E. Moore
8. Willard Van Orman Quine
9. George Berkeley
10. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
11. John Dewey
12. Alfred North Whitehead
13. Rudolf Carnap
14. Ludwig Wittgenstein
15. René Descartes
16. John Locke
17. Clarence Irving Lewis
18. Socrates
19. John Stuart Mill
20. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
21. Gottlob Frege
22. A. J. Ayer
23. William James
24. Edmund Husserl
25. Nelson Goodman

By the 1950s, the top eight are four leading historical figures -- Kant, Plato, Aristotle, and Hume -- and four leading analytic philosophers: Russell, Gilbert Ryle (1900-1976), G. E. Moore, and W. V. O. Quine (1908-2000). Neither Ryle nor Quine were among the top 100 in 1940s, so their rise to #6 and #8 was sudden.

Gottlob Frege (1848-1925) also makes his first, long-posthumous appearance.

1960s:

1. Aristotle
2. Immanuel Kant
3. Ludwig Wittgenstein
4. David Hume
5. Plato
6. René Descartes
7. P. F. Strawson
8. Willard Van Orman Quine
9. Bertrand Russell
10. J. L. Austin
11. John Dewey
12. Rudolf Carnap
13. Edmund Husserl
14. Socrates
15. Norman Malcolm
16. G. E. Moore
17. Gottlob Frege
18. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
19. George Berkeley
20. R. M. Hare
21. John Stuart Mill
22. Gilbert Ryle
23. A. J. Ayer
24. Karl Popper
25. Carl Gustav Hempel

Wittgenstein is back with a vengeance at #3. Other analytic philosophers, in order, are P. F. Strawson, Quine, Russell, Austin, Carnap, Norman Malcolm (1911-1990), Moore, Frege, R. M. Hare (1919-2002), Ryle, Ayer, Karl Popper (1902-1994), and Carl Hempel (1905-1997).

Apart from pre-20th-century historical giants, it's all analytic philosophers, except for Dewey and Husserl.

Finally, the 1970s:

1. Willard Van Orman Quine
2. Immanuel Kant
3. David Hume
4. Aristotle
5. Ludwig Wittgenstein
6. Plato
7. John Locke
8. René Descartes
9. Karl Popper
10. Rudolf Carnap
11. Gottlob Frege
12. Edmund Husserl
13. Hans Reichenbach
14. Socrates
15. P. F. Strawson
16. Donald Davidson
17. John Stuart Mill
18. Bertrand Russell
19. Thomas Reid
20. Benedictus de Spinoza
21. Nelson Goodman
22. Carl Gustav Hempel
23. John Rawls
24. Karl Marx
25. Saul Kripke

With the continuing exception of Husserl, the list is again historical giants plus analytic philosophers. Interesting to see Marx enter at #24. Hans Reichenbach (1891-1953) has a strong debut at #13. Ryle's decline is striking, from #6 in the 1950s to #22 in the 1960s to off the list at #51 in the 1970s.

At the very bottom of the list, #25, we see the first "Silent Generation" philosopher: Saul Kripke (1940-2022). In a recent citation analysis of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, I found that the Silent Generation has so far had impressive overall influence and staying power in mainstream Anglophone philosophy. It would be interesting to see if this influence continues.

The only philosopher born after 1800 who makes both the 1890s and the 1970s top 25 is John Stuart Mill. Peirce and James still rank among the top 100 in the 1970s (#58 and #86). None of the other stars of the 1890s -- Spencer, Herbert, Lotze, Bradley, Green -- are still among the top 100 by the 1970s, and I think it's fair to say they are hardly read except by specialists.

Similar remarks apply to most of the stars of the 1900s, 1910s, and 1920s: Bergson, Bosanquet, Royce, Schiller, C. D. Broad, and George Santayana are no longer widely read. Two exceptions are Russell, who persists in the top 25 through the 1970s, and Dewey who falls from the top 25 but still remains in the top 100, at #87.

Also, in case you didn't notice: no women or people of color (as we would now classify them) appear on any of these lists, apart from "Buddha" in the 1890s.

In my recent Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy analysis, the most-cited living philosophers were Timothy Williamson, Martha Nussbaum, Thomas Nagel, Frank Jackson, John Searle, and David Chalmers. However, none of them is probably as dominant now as Spencer, James, Bradley, Russell, Bosanquet, and Bergson were at the peak of their influence.

---------------------------------------

[1] The Edhiphy designers estimate "82%-91%" precision, but I'm not sure what that means. I'd assume that "Wittgenstein" and "Carnap" would hit with almost 100% precision. Does it follow others might be as low as 40%? There certainly are some problems. I noticed, for example, that R. Jay Wallace, born in 1957, has 78 mentions in the 1890s. I spot checked "Russell", "Austin", "James", and "Berkeley", finding only a few false positives for Russell and Austin (e.g., misclassified references to legal philosopher John Austin). I found significantly more false positives for William James (including references to Henry James and some authors with the first name James, such as psychologist James Ward), but still probably not more than 10%. For "Berkeley" there were a similar number of false positives referencing the university or city. I didn't attempt to check for false negatives.

[Bosanquet and Bergson used to be hugely influential]

The Not-So-Silent Generation in Philosophy

The Silent Generation (born 1928-1945) is disproportionately represented among the most-cited authors in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Let's look at the numbers and think about why.

Background: This post is based on my analyses of citation rates in the Stanford Encyclopedia in 2010, 2014, 2019, and 2024. As a measure of prominence in (as I call it) "mainstream Anglophone philosophy", no measure has better face validity than SEP citation rates. For example, in my most recent analysis, the top five are David Lewis, W. V. O. Quine, Hilary Putnam, John Rawls, and Saul Kripke -- a much more plausible top 5, if the aim is to capture influence in mainstream Anglophone philosophy -- than top five lists from, say, Scopus, Google Scholar, or PhilPapers.

The Ten Most-Cited Philosophers, Generation by Generation

[update 12:49 pm: Some of the ranks below were incorrect due to a problem with the tie-counting algorithm I used today. This does not affect the analysis or August's original rankings. HT Daniel Nolan for the catch.]

"Greatest Generation" (born 1900-1927):

2. Quine, Willard van Orman (213)
3. Putnam, Hilary (190)
4. Rawls, John (168)
7. Davidson, Donald (151)
16. Strawson, Peter F. (116)
23. Dummett, Michael A. E. (110)
26. Armstrong, David M. (106)
26. Chisholm, Roderick M. (106)
34. Popper, Karl R. (94)
35. Goodman, Nelson (90)

The initial number before their name indicates their ranking in the most recent analysis, the number in parentheses indicates the number of main-page SEP entries in which they are cited.

"Silent Generation" (born 1928-1945)

1. Lewis, David K. (307)
5. Kripke, Saul A. (159)
8. Williams, Bernard (146)
10. Nagel, Thomas (137)
11. Nozick, Robert (135)
12. Jackson, Frank (130)
13. Searle, John R. (120)
14. Van Fraassen, Bas C. (117)
16. Harman, Gilbert H. (116)
18. Fodor, Jerry A. (115)

"Baby Boomers" (born 1946-1964)

6. Williamson, Timothy (152)
9. Nussbaum, Martha C. (140)
19. Fine, Kit (112)
24. Kitcher, Philip (109)
29. Sober, Elliott (101)
32. Hawthorne, John (97)
40. Anderson, Elizabeth S. (83)
45. Korsgaard, Christine M. (80)
51. Priest, Graham (79)
53. Burge, Tyler (77)

"Generation X" or "Millennial" (born 1965 and later) [list extended to 14 due to a tie]

14. Chalmers, David J. (117)
45. Schaffer, Jonathan (80)
78. Sider, Theodore (68)
129. Godfrey-Smith, Peter (53)
138. Stanley, Jason (51)
156. Enoch, David (48)
156. Prinz, Jesse J. (48)
165. Weatherson, Brian (47)
173. Levy, Neil (46)
203. Craver, Carl F. (42)
203. Kriegel, Uriah (42)
203. List, Christian (42)
203. Nolan, Daniel (42)
203. Thomasson, Amie L. (42)

(In most cases, I have exact birth year from publicly available sources such as Wikipedia, but in some cases I estimate based on year of Bachelor's degree, PhD, or first publication. I welcome corrections.)

As discussed in a previous post, one striking thing about this list is its lack of gender and cultural/racial diversity (see also these articles on lack of diversity in philosophy). But another striking feature is the prominence of the Silent Generation. Analyzed another way: Among the 25 most-cited authors, 6 are Greatest, 14 are Silent, 4 are Boomers, and 1 is Gen X. Among the top 100 (104 with ties), it's Greatest 25, Silent 47, Boomer 27, and Gen X 3. (Note also that Greatest is by far the longest generation, 28 years, compared to the Silent’s 18, the Boomer’s 19, and Gen X’s 16; arguably this should be figured into a generational influence divisor.)

Citation Patterns Over Time

A natural first thought is that the 2020s might just be peak-citation time for the Silent Generation. Maybe the work of the Greatest Generation is starting to fall back into the mists of history, and maybe the Boomers and Gen Xers haven't yet had their full impact on philosophical discourse.

However, this appears not to be the explanation.

As an initial analysis, I looked at what years (1900 through forthcoming) are most commonly cited in the SEP. The results:

[click to enlarge and clarify]

As the graph shows, citation year peaks around 2011-2013. Members of the Silent Generation were in their late 60s to mid-80s in those years. Some of them were definitely still publishing, but age 65-85 is not most philosophers' peak productive period. Consider the top ten Silents, for example. Lewis, Williams, and Nozick were already deceased by 2011. The most influential work of the remaining seven was published in the late 1960s to early 1990s.

Now I do think that raw publication-year data are potentially somewhat misleading. Stanford Encyclopedia entries tend, I suspect, to disproportionately cite recent work (5-10 years old) that has gained some attention, even if that work has not (yet) been very impactful, so as to stay up to date. (2011-2013 was more than ten years ago, but the entries tend to get substantial updates only every 5-10 years.) A better measure might be longitudinal trends in citation rank. My methods haven't been exactly the same year to year, but close enough.

All but five of the 202 most-cited philosophers in 2010 are among the 376 most cited in 2024, and the greatest decline in citation rank has been among the Silent Generation. We can see this by subtracting the natural logarithms of the ranks. (I use a negative log basis, because a decline from rank 11 to 20 is much more significant than a decline from rank 191 to 200). For the Greatest generation the average change is -0.13, for Silent it's -0.19, for Boom it's -0.09, and for Generation X there's an average rank gain of +0.21. There's a similar pattern if we compare the 2014 and 2019 analyses with 2024: The Gen Xers are rising in relative rank while all other generations are declining.

These numbers exclude people who are new to the rankings (or who fall completely off the rankings), and most of my ranking updates contain some new authors from each generation -- partly because I expand the length of the list every year but also partly because some people gain in citation rate even well past their death.

One approach to that analytic problem is to compare authors ranked at least 300 (304 with ties) in 2024 with the 2019 list of 295 authors: approximately comparable lists, five years separated. Twenty-seven authors were among the 2019 top 295 but not the 2024 top 304: 6 Greatest, 10 Silent, 9 Boomer, and 2 Gen X. Conversely, thirty-six authors not on the list in 2019 were among the top 304 in 2024: 0 Greatest, 9 Silent, 12 Boomer, and 15 Gen X.

As one might expect from the various analyses so far, the Silents are even more disproportionately represented in the 2010 rankings than in the 2024 rankings: Among the top 25 in 2010, 16 were Silent, compared to 7 Greatest, 2 Boomer, and 1 Gen X.

The analyses thus all tell a similar story: The high representation of Silent Generation philosophers in my list of the most-cited Stanford Encyclopedia authors cannot be that it is currently their peak citation time.

Further indirect support for this claim also comes from an old finding of mine, drawing on Philosophers Index abstracts, that philosophers tend to have their work discussed most when they are approximately age 55-70.

The Not-So-Silent Generation and the Baby Boom Philosophy Bust

So, what explains the Silent Generation's disproportionate representation among the most influential philosophers in the mainstream Anglophone tradition? I suggest that their influence is due to their objective importance. They achieved this importance through lucky timing and rising to a cultural occasion.

In the Anglophone world, especially the United States, the 1960s and 1970s were times of sharp university enrollment growth, as Silent Generation scholars were hired to teach the Boomers, as the college degree came to be seen as the standard path to social status and economic security, and as universities basked in the high prestige of science in this era (cultural pride in the space race, the success of the Manhattan Project, the polio vaccine, computers, antibiotics....). The academic job market was ridiculously easy by the standards of every subsequent decade, and professors from this era tell tales of how they landed jobs in the most prestigious universities sometimes with a single phone call.

The Silent Generation thus had a great demographic advantage: They were entering the profession in boom times. They engaged with their elders (Quine, Rawls, and Strawson, for example; Putnam and Davidson are edge cases due to Putnam's near-cutoff age and Davidson's late start), but even more, they engaged directly with one another, filling the journals with articles about the issues that interested them. Much of their seminal work was published in the 1970s while they were relatively young, and this work framed the debates of the 1980s, and the 1990s, and the early 2000s, and to a substantial extent (as my SEP analyses suggest) even today.

The Boomers entered the academic job market mostly in the doldrums of 1980s, when there were far fewer open positions at elite universities. They grew in the shade of the Not-So-Silents, who were then mid-career and in no mood to yield the floor. Their work was largely shaped in reaction to leading Silents, such as Lewis, Kripke, Williams, Nagel, Searle, Van Fraassen, and Fodor. (I suspect this was especially so in the so-called "core" areas of philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, epistemology, and metaphysics, somewhat less so in ethics, political philosophy, philosophy of science, aesthetics, and history of philosophy.) There was just less of an opportunity for Boomers to shape the dialogue.

To some extent, a similar story holds for Generation X: The older Gen Xers (like myself) entered academia as the (Not-So-)Silents were senior professors in their sixties -- young enough to still be active, old enough to have the most senior positions in academia, in that sweet-spot between ages 55 and 70 when philosophers tend to receive the most prestige and attention. It is perhaps a little early to tell how badly shaded out the Gen X philosophers have been. Still, I'm inclined to think it's clear that we have been at least somewhat shaded out. We Gen Xers are now on average about age fifty, and so far probably only Chalmers has had the kind of impact on the field that the leading Greatest and Silent generation philosophers generally had by age fifty. (As noted above, in the 2024 SEP rankings, only three Gen Xers rank among the top 100: Chalmers at #14, Schaffer at #45, and Sider at #78.)

A Golden Age of Philosophical Naturalism?

All this said, I don't think demographics is the whole story. The Silents also had an occasion to rise to: the articulation of a thoroughly secular philosophical worldview. There have of course been atheists and scientific naturalists in every generation of philosophers in modern history, but in all previous historical contexts, these "naturalist" philosophers were to some extent on the defensive. The Silent generation was the first generation that took atheism and scientific materialism for granted. (Of course not everyone was a naturalist, but in mainstream Anglophone academic philosophy circles, critics of atheism and scientific materialism were very much on the defensive.) This created a context in which that generation could begin to explore in detail, and in dialogue with one another, in a supportive but also competitive context of shared secular assumptions, scientifically inspired approaches to the mind, language, meaning, and value. Arguably, it was a Golden Age of philosophical naturalism, laying the foundations on which all subsequent naturalist approaches have been built.

This is my theory, then, of the Not-So-Silent Generation in mainstream Anglophone philosophy. They had a huge demographic advantage in being hired just as university enrollments were booming, and a major philosophical task fell in their laps through cultural timing: the task laying the foundations of a thoroughly secular, scientific philosophy. They rose to this task and thus became not just a demographically dominant but a philosophically important generation, which will collectively be remembered (perhaps through a few emblematic names).

Is there a broad philosophical task of similar magnitude facing the now-rising generation of philosophers? I'm not sure. (As Hegel said, the owl of Minera flies only at dusk: We understand our cultural moment only in retrospect, as it is fading into history.) But maybe Artificial Intelligence and breakthroughs in the capacity to control human and non-human physiology will radically transform the world, enabling new types of life on the planet (conscious machines? post- or trans-humans?). If so, then maybe Millennial and Zoomer philosophers will have their own world-historical task to rise to: that of helping us understand the philosophical implications of the radical transformations such technologies enable.

-----------------------------------------

Related:

"Discussion Arcs" (Apr 27, 2010)

"At What Age Do Philosophers Do Their Most Influential Work?" (May 12, 2010)

"The Base Rate of Kant" (Jan 26, 2012)

"Age Effects on SEP Citation, Plus the Baby Boom Philosophy Bust and The Winnowing of Greats" (Sep 27, 2019)

"Where Have All The Fodors Gone? Or: The Golden Age of Philosophical Naturalism" (Nov 18, 2021)

Women Constitute 12% and People of Color 3% of the Most-Cited Contemporary Authors in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Last week, I posted a list of the 376 most-cited contemporary authors (born 1900 or later) in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Citation in the SEP is, I think, a better measure of influence in what I call "mainstream Anglophone philosophy" than more standard bibliometric measures, like Google Scholar and Web of Science.

In previous work, my collaborators and I have generally found that within U.S. academic philosophy, the higher in rank or prestige the target group, the less racial and gender diversity. Accordingly, one might expect people at very highest levels of prestige in mainstream Anglophone philosophy overwhelmingly to be non-Hispanic White men.

I attempted to code the gender (woman, man, nonbinary) of every philosopher in the SEP most-cited 376, based on a combination of personal and professional knowledge, information from the web, and gender-typicality of their name and photos. On similar grounds, I attempted to code every author on this list as either Hispanic/Latino or non-Hispanic/Latino and, among the non-Hispanic authors, White or non-White (using race/ethnicity categories as standardly defined in the U.S.). This is an imperfect exercise, and it wouldn't surprise me if I've made some mistakes. I hope you'll correct me if you notice any errors (raw data here), and please accept my apologies in advance![1]

I also guessed birth year. In the majority of cases, I found birthyear information on Wikipedia or another easily available source. Otherwise, I estimated based on year of Bachelor's degree (estimating 22 years old), year of PhD (estimating 29 years old), or year of first solo-authored publication (also estimating 29 years old). This enables some generational comparisons. Again, I welcome corrections.

Overall, among the 376 philosophers, I count 44 women (12%) and one non-binary person (#223, Judith Butler). I count only eleven (3%) who are Hispanic and/or non-White. Only one of the 376 is a woman of color (#260, Linda Martín Alcoff), and 321 (85%) are non-Hispanic White men.

Here it is as a pie chart:

[click to enlarge and clarify]

The gender skew is even more extreme if we consider the top 100 (actually the top 102, accounting for ties): six women (6%) and 97% non-Hispanic White. The highest ranked person of color is Jaegwon Kim at #59.

As you might expect, the skew is larger in the older generations (born before 1946) than in the younger generations. Over the past several decades, there has tended to be a slow reduction in gender and racial disparity in U.S. academic philosophy (see, e.g., here and here). However, the generational disparity reduction in the SEP is fairly small.

I analyzed generational trends in two ways: First, I binned philosophers by estimated birthyear into one of four generations: "Greatest" (1900-1924), "Silent" (1925-1945), "Boomer" (1946-1964), and "Generation X" (1965-1979). (One "Millenial" was [update Aug 14] Two older Millennials were binned with the Gen-Xers.) Second, I looked at correlations between the demographic categories and birthyear.

Gender analysis by generation:
Greatest: 40/44 men (91%)
Silent: 133/145 (92%)
Boomer: 116/136 (85%)
Gen X: 42/51 (82%)

Expressed as a correlation of gender (man = 1, woman or nonbinary = 0) with birthyear: r = -.10, p = .046. This negative correlation indicates that as birthyear increases (i.e., the philosopher is younger), the philosopher is less likely to be a man. However, the size of the effect is small and barely crosses the conventional p < .05 threshold of statistical significance. The nine highest-ranked Gen-Xers are all White men. No Gen X women rank among the top 200.

Among the eleven philosophers who are Hispanic/Latino or non-White, none are Greatest, five are Silent, four are Boomers, and two are Gen X. Statistical analysis is of limited value with such small numbers, but for what it's worth, status in this category does directionally correlate with birthyear, with a very small effect size and no statistical significance (r = -.06, p = .25).

ETA 10:46 a.m.:

To see if there's a relationship between gender and rank on the list, I took the natural log of the ranks (since the difference between rank 1 and rank 11 is much more meaningful than between rank 301 and 311) and calculated its correlation with gender (1 = man, 0 = woman or nonbinary): r = -.12, p = .016. The negative relationship of course indicates that men are likely to be higher ranked (i.e., closer to rank 1). As before, race/ethnicity numbers are probably too small for meaningful statistical analysis, but for completeness the result is a virtually flat r = -.02, p = .77.

----------------------------------

In an independent analysis, Liam Kofi Bright counts nine non-White philosophers on this list, exactly matching my analysis except omitting two (not non-White?) Latino philosophers (Sosa and Bueno). This supports my sense of how the philosophers on this list are racially perceived by others in the field. (One complication: Bueno identifies as Brazilian, and there's a lot of confusion about whether Brazilian counts as "Hispanic" in the U.S. context.)

The 376 Most-Cited Contemporary Authors in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Time for my five-year update of the most-cited authors in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy! (Past analyses: 2010, 2014, 2019.)

Image of a young David K. Lewis [source]

Method

* Only authors born 1900 or later are included.

* Each author is only counted once per headline entry (subentries are excluded). In 2010, I found that this generated more plausible results than counting authors multiple times per entry.

* As in 2019, but unlike 2014 and 2010, I include co-authors. Due to the unsystematic formatting of SEP references, this was a somewhat noisy process. To capture last authors, I searched for "and" or "&" in each bibliographic line, if appearing before a "19", "20", "forthcoming", or "in press", then pulled the text immediately after. To capture second authors that were not last authors, I searched for a second comma before such a date-preceding "and" or "&", then pulled the text after that. I omitted co-authors in position three or higher unless they were last author. Fortunately for the analysis, co-authorship is relatively uncommon in philosophy compared to the sciences, constituting by my estimate less than 10% of the bibliographic lines.

* Also as in 2019 but unlike 2014, I included editors, but only if their name appears before the date in the bibliographical line. Putting the editor at the front of the bibliographical line highlights the editor's role or the edited collection as a whole.

* After computerized search and sort, I hand-coded the data, in some cases correcting misspellings and merging authors (e.g., Ruth Barcan = Ruth Marcus), more often separating authors with similar names (e.g., various A. Goldmans and J. Cohens), in a process that involved some guesswork and pattern recognition. Inconsistent syntax and imperfect redundancy removal procedures also created some error, though nothing large or systematic that I noticed. Bear in mind that with about 208,000 bibliographic entries, perfection is not possible! I estimate coding error of up to about +/- 2 entries.

* To find the equivalent score of an author not included on this list, you can search the SEP site and count the number of hits, subtracting appearances in subentries and appearances other than first, second, or last headline editor or author in a bibliographic line (near the beginning of the entry, before the date). I also welcome thoughtful corrections that apply this method.

This list generates a rough measure of current influence in what I call "mainstream Anglophone philosophy" (a sociological category I have defined and discussed, e.g., here and here). For example, the top five -- Lewis, Quine, Putnam, Rawls, and Kripke -- are the same (in a different order) as the top five in Brian Leiter's poll results concerning the best Anglophone philosophers since 1957. Better-known bibliographic metrics, like Google Scholar and Web of Science do not as accurately measure this particular sociological phenomenon. See my 2021 discussion of ranking philosophy rankings.

The list captures, if anything, a moment in one particular academic philosophical culture. For example, despite Michel Foucault's huge global academic influence, mainstream Anglophone philosophers rarely cite him, and on this list he ranks #187.

Further caveats:

* Philosophers who work on topics that are underrepresented in the Stanford Encyclopedia relative to their visibility in mainstream Anglophone philosophy will appear lower on the list than their eminence would suggest.

* Authors who have a transformative impact in one area will probably be underrepresented or underranked relative to authors who make significant but less transformative contributions to several topics.

* Editors of the Stanford Encyclopedia might be somewhat overrepresented, since they might tend to disproportionately solicit entries on topics to which they have contributed and authors might feel some pressure to cite them in their entries.

* Given a large bias toward citing recent work, philosophers whose main contributions were before 1960 are probably substantially underrated on this list relative to their influence in mainstream Anglophone philosophy.

* Yes, I'm on this list (in a tie for #232). I find this somewhat embarrassing, since I think this method substantially overrates me (see the 2nd and 4th caveats). If you could withhold congratulations and comparisons, I'd appreciate it!

As I did in 2019, I will follow up later with some demographic analyses. Thanks to UCR comp lit and philosophy student Jordan Jackson for his help with the computer code.

[Updated Aug. 9, to remove two authors born before 1900 and to correct one misspelling.]

1. Lewis, David K. (cited in 307 different main entries)
2. Quine, Willard van Orman (213)
3. Putnam, Hilary (190)
4. Rawls, John (168)
5. Kripke, Saul A. (159)
6. Williamson, Timothy (152)
7. Davidson, Donald (151)
8. Williams, Bernard (146)
9. Nussbaum, Martha C. (140)
10. Nagel, Thomas (137)
11. Nozick, Robert (135)
12. Jackson, Frank (130)
13. Searle, John R. (120)
14. Chalmers, David J. (117)
14. Van Fraassen, Bas C. (117)
16. Harman, Gilbert H. (116)
16. Strawson, Peter F. (116)
18. Fodor, Jerry A. (115)
19. Fine, Kit (112)
19. Parfit, Derek (112)
19. Stalnaker, Robert C. (112)
22. Dennett, Daniel C. (110)
22. Dummett, Michael A. E. (110)
24. Kitcher, Philip (109)
24. Pettit, Philip (109)
26. Armstrong, David M. (106)
26. Chisholm, Roderick M. (106)
28. Van Inwagen, Peter (102)
29. Dworkin, Ronald (101)
29. Scanlon, Thomas M. (101)
29. Sober, Elliott (101)
32. Hawthorne, John (97)
33. McDowell, John H. (96)
34. Popper, Karl R. (94)
35. Goodman, Nelson (90)
35. Hacking, Ian (90)
37. Raz, Joseph (89)
38. Geach, Peter T. (88)
38. Goldman, Alvin I. (88)
40. Anderson, Elizabeth S. (83)
40. Bennett, Jonathan (83)
42. Hintikka, Jaakko (82)
43. Adams, Robert Merrihew (81)
43. Plantinga, Alvin C. (81)
45. Anscombe, G. E. M. (80)
45. Korsgaard, Christine M. (80)
45. Mackie, John L. (80)
45. Schaffer, Jonathan (80)
45. Tarski, Alfred (80)
45. Wright, Crispin (80)
51. Priest, Graham (79)
52. Dretske, Fred I. (78)
53. Alston, William P. (77)
53. Burge, Tyler (77)
55. Ayer, Alfred J. (76)
55. Gibbard, Allan (76)
55. Gödel, Kurt (76)
58. Horgan, Terence E. (75)
59. Kim, Jaegwon (73)
59. Stich, Stephen P. (73)
61. Kaplan, David (72)
61. Thomson, Judith Jarvis (72)
63. Field, Hartry H. (71)
63. Kuhn, Thomas S. (71)
63. Lycan, William G. (71)
63. Rescher, Nicholas (71)
63. Sellars, Wilfrid (71)
63. Singer, Peter (71)
69. Blackburn, Simon (70)
69. Evans, Gareth (70)
69. Hempel, Carl G. (70)
69. Zalta, Edward N. (70)
73. Frankfurt, Harry G. (69)
73. Ramsey, Frank P. (69)
73. Rosen, Gideon (69)
73. Sosa, Ernest (69)
73. Woodward, James (69)
78. Earman, John (68)
78. Perry, John (68)
78. Sider, Theodore (68)
78. Smith, Michael (68)
78. Waldron, Jeremy (68)
83. Feinberg, Joel (67)
83. Sen, Amartya K. (67)
83. Swinburne, Richard G. (67)
83. Wiggins, David (67)
87. Barnes, Jonathan (66)
87. Lowe, E. J. (66)
87. Skyrms, Brian (66)
87. Velleman, J. David (66)
91. Annas, Julia (65)
91. MacIntyre, Alasdair (65)
91. Shoemaker, Sydney S. (65)
94. Darwall, Stephen L. (64)
94. Grice, H. Paul (64)
94. Ryle, Gilbert (64)
94. Shapiro, Stewart (64)
98. Nichols, Shaun (63)
98. Prior, Arthur N. (63)
98. Soames, Scott (63)
98. Taylor, Charles (63)
98. Yablo, Stephen (63)
103. Church, Alonzo (62)
103. Habermas, Jürgen (62)
103. Young, Iris Marion (62)
106. Block, Ned (61)
106. Jeffrey, Richard C. (61)
108. Friedman, Michael (60)
108. Hare, Richard M. (60)
108. Peacocke, Christopher (60)
111. Brink, David O. (59)
111. Burgess, John P. (59)
111. Cartwright, Nancy (59)
111. Sorabji, Richard (59)
115. Austin, J. L. (57)
115. Smart, J. J. C. (57)
115. van Benthem, Johan F. (57)
118. Arneson, Richard J. (56)
118. Foot, Philippa (56)
118. Kenny, Anthony (56)
118. Miller, David (56)
118. Papineau, David (56)
123. Dupré, John (55)
123. Irwin, Terence H. (55)
123. Simons, Peter M. (55)
126. Audi, Robert (54)
126. Dancy, Jonathan (54)
126. McGinn, Colin (54)
129. Churchland, Paul M. (53)
129. Devitt, Michael (53)
129. Godfrey-Smith, Peter (53)
129. Hart, H. L. A. (53)
129. Parsons, Terence (53)
134. Belnap, Nuel D. (52)
134. Carruthers, Peter (52)
134. Chomsky, Noam (52)
134. Tye, Michael (52)
138. Buchanan, Allen E. (51)
138. Clark, Andy (51)
138. Glymour, Clark (51)
138. Rorty, Richard (51)
138. Sedley, David N. (51)
138. Stanley, Jason (51)
138. Wolterstorff, Nicholas (51)
145. Griffiths, Paul E. (50)
145. LePore, Ernest (50)
145. Montague, Richard (50)
145. Schofield, Malcolm (50)
145. von Neumann, John (50)
150. Barwise, Jon (49)
150. Brandom, Robert B. (49)
150. Haslanger, Sally (49)
150. Johnston, Mark (49)
150. Railton, Peter (49)
150. Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter (49)
156. Appiah, Kwame Anthony (48)
156. Boolos, George (48)
156. Enoch, David (48)
156. Millikan, Ruth Garrett (48)
156. Prinz, Jesse J. (48)
156. Salmon, Wesley C. (48)
156. Sartre, Jean-Paul (48)
156. Strawson, Galen (48)
156. Stump, Eleonore (48)
165. Cooper, John M. (47)
165. Horwich, Paul (47)
165. Kretzmann, Norman (47)
165. Longino, Helen E. (47)
165. Mancosu, Paolo (47)
165. Sterelny, Kim (47)
165. Weatherson, Brian (47)
165. Wood, Allen W. (47)
173. Feferman, Solomon (46)
173. Hale, Bob (46)
173. Kahneman, Daniel (46)
173. Levy, Neil (46)
173. Norton, John D. (46)
173. Sandel, Michael J. (46)
173. Suppes, Patrick (46)
180. Guyer, Paul (45)
180. Maudlin, Tim (45)
180. Mellor, D. Hugh (45)
180. Okin, Susan Moller (45)
180. Read, Stephen L. (45)
180. Salmón, Nathan U. (45)
180. Van Cleve, James (45)
187. Beiser, Frederick C. (44)
187. Burnyeat, Myles F. (44)
187. Cohen, Gerald A. (44)
187. Foucault, Michel (44)
187. Hurka, Thomas (44)
187. McLaughlin, Brian P. (44)
187. Mele, Alfred R. (44)
187. O'Neill, Onora (44)
187. Unger, Peter (44)
196. Broome, John (43)
196. Davies, Martin (43)
196. Elster, Jon (43)
196. Hull, David L. (43)
196. Lehrer, Keith (43)
196. Scheffler, Samuel (43)
196. Walzer, Michael (43)
203. Boghossian, Paul A. (42)
203. Craver, Carl F. (42)
203. Finnis, John (42)
203. Gauthier, David P. (42)
203. Goodin, Robert E. (42)
203. Kriegel, Uriah (42)
203. Laudan, Larry (42)
203. List, Christian (42)
203. Loewer, Barry (42)
203. Nolan, Daniel (42)
203. Slote, Michael A. (42)
203. Sunstein, Cass R. (42)
203. Thomasson, Amie L. (42)
203. Zagzebski, Linda Trinkaus (42)
217. Byrne, Alex (41)
217. Fricker, Miranda (41)
217. Kymlicka, Will (41)
217. Long, A. A. (41)
217. Schiffer, Stephen (41)
217. Smith, Barry (at Buffalo) (41)
223. Bach, Kent (40)
223. Barry, Brian (40)
223. Butler, Judith (40)
223. Garber, Daniel (40)
223. Heil, John (40)
223. Huemer, Michael (40)
223. Machery, Edouard (40)
223. Merricks, Trenton (40)
223. Restall, Greg (40)
232. Bealer, George (39)
232. Bechtel, William (39)
232. Colyvan, Mark (39)
232. Crisp, Roger (39)
232. Feldman, Fred (39)
232. Gabbay, Dov M. (39)
232. Gärdenfors, Peter (39)
232. Hampton, Jean (39)
232. McMahan, Jeff (39)
232. Nagel, Ernest (39)
232. Schwitzgebel, Eric (39)
232. Wolf, Susan (39)
244. Bird, Alexander (38)
244. Bueno, Otávio (38)
244. Crane, Tim (38)
244. Gendler, Tamar Szabó (38)
244. Hájek, Alan (38)
244. Ladyman, James (38)
244. Pasnau, Robert (38)
251. Feldman, Richard (37)
251. Halpern, Joseph Y. (37)
251. Kagan, Shelly (37)
251. Lange, Marc (37)
251. Pearl, Judea (37)
251. Pollock, John L. (37)
251. Rosenberg, Alex (37)
251. Schroeder, Mark (37)
251. Wedgwood, Ralph (37)
260. Alcoff, Linda Martín (36)
260. Baker, Lynne Rudder (36)
260. Bonjour, Laurence (36)
260. Brandt, Richard B. (36)
260. Conee, Earl (36)
260. Feyerabend, Paul K. (36)
260. Lewontin, Richard C. (36)
260. Linsky, Bernard (36)
260. Lloyd, Elisabeth A. (36)
260. Marcus, Ruth Barcan (36)
260. Sperber, Dan (36)
260. Teller, Paul (36)
272. Adamson, Peter (35)
272. Beall, J. C. (35)
272. Boyd, Richard (35)
272. Bratman, Michael E. (35)
272. Callender, Craig (35)
272. Cresswell, Max J. (35)
272. Hitchcock, Christopher R. (35)
272. Hurley, Susan L. (35)
272. Kittay, Eva Feder (35)
272. Matthen, Mohan (35)
272. Okasha, Samir (35)
272. Parsons, Charles (35)
272. Sainsbury, R. Mark (35)
272. Scott, Dana S. (35)
272. Sorensen, Roy A. (35)
287. Benacerraf, Paul (34)
287. Benhabib, Seyla (34)
287. Brogaard, Berit (34)
287. Cohen, Joshua (34)
287. Currie, Greg (34)
287. Darden, Lindley (34)
287. Flanagan, Owen (34)
287. Kahn, Charles H. (34)
287. Kamm, Frances M. (34)
287. Kleene, Stephen C. (34)
287. Mulligan, Kevin (34)
287. Paul, Laurie A. (34)
287. Pereboom, Derk (34)
287. Pogge, Thomas W. (34)
287. Recanati, François (34)
287. Shafer-Landau, Russ (34)
287. Thagard, Paul (34)
287. Watson, Gary (34)
305. Baier, Annette C. (33)
305. Barnes, Elizabeth (33)
305. Black, Max (33)
305. Gallagher, Shaun (33)
305. Giere, Ronald N. (33)
305. Gould, Stephen Jay (33)
305. Griffin, James (33)
305. Kneale, William (33)
305. Price, Huw (33)
305. Pritchard, Duncan (33)
305. Thomason, Richmond H. (33)
305. Turing, Alan M. (33)
305. Tversky, Amos (33)
305. Wimsatt, William C. (33)
319. Adams, Marilyn McCord (32)
319. Beebee, Helen C. (32)
319. Bennett, Karen (32)
319. Craig, William Lane (32)
319. Ebbesen, Sten (32)
319. Frede, Michael (32)
319. Hatfield, Gary (32)
319. Kreisel, Georg (32)
319. Langton, Rae (32)
319. Levinson, Jerrold (32)
319. Machamer, Peter (32)
319. Pateman, Carole (32)
319. Penrose, Roger (32)
319. Rey, Georges (32)
319. Varzi, Achille C. (32)
319. Zimmerman, Dean W. (32)
335. Allison, Henry E. (31)
335. Ashworth, E. Jennifer (31)
335. Berlin, Isaiah (31)
335. Cappelen, Herman (31)
335. Copp, David (31)
335. Daniels, Norman (31)
335. Hartmann, Stephan (31)
335. Hellman, Geoffrey Paul (31)
335. Hooker, Brad (31)
335. Kornblith, Hilary (31)
335. Kvanvig, Jonathan L. (31)
335. Leitgeb, Hannes (31)
335. MacFarlane, John (31)
335. MacKinnon, Catharine A. (31)
335. McDaniel, Kris (31)
335. Mills, Charles W. (31)
335. Oppy, Graham (31)
335. Rea, Michael (31)
335. Sarkar, Sahotra (31)
335. Savulescu, Julian (31)
335. Sylvan, Richard (31)
335. Vlastos, Gregory (31)
357. Bayne, Tim (30)
357. Butterfield, Jeremy (30)
357. Cameron, Ross P. (30)
357. Dawkins, Richard (30)
357. Egan, Andy (30)
357. Fischer, John Martin (30)
357. Gaus, Gerald F. (30)
357. Hill, Thomas E., Jr. (30)
357. Hodges, Wilfrid (30)
357. Hornsby, Jennifer (30)
357. Howson, Colin (30)
357. Joyce, Richard (30)
357. Kneale, Martha (30)
357. Levi, Isaac (30)
357. Maynard Smith, John (30)
357. Nadler, Steven (30)
357. Scruton, Roger (30)
357. Siegel, Susanna (30)
357. Von Wright, Georg Henrik (30)
357. Weisberg, Michael (30)