This is a list of living people of significant historical importance, influence within their discipline, and popular notability. In connection with an on-going debate about the criteria for inclusion on the ITN main-page portal, it is proposed that the death of a member of this list would warrant inclusion.
Criteria for inclusion include several of the following:
- Popular notability beyond the boundaries of their field or discipline
- Enduring notability beyond a generation or popular era
- Noted for a body of work that singularly altered their field or discipline
- Holding a prominent and powerful office for an unusual length of time
- Winning major awards in their field or discipline (Nobel, Oscar, Grammy, Pulitzer[clarification needed], Olympic medal, MVP (Most Valuable Player), etc.)
- Holding several records in their field or discipline
- Induction into a professional Hall of Fame, inclusion on a major Top n List
Actors and entertainers
- Woody Allen
- Julie Andrews
- Richard Attenborough
- Lauren Bacall
- Amitabh Bachchan
- Jeff Bridges
- Gay Byrne
- Michael Caine
- Jim Carrey
- Jackie Chan
- Julie Christie
- Tom Cruise
- Billy Connolly
- Sean Connery
- Stephen Colbert
- Michael Crawford
- Daniel Day-Lewis
- Olivia de Havilland
- Robert De Niro
- Kirk Douglas
- Clint Eastwood
- Harrison Ford
- Jodie Foster
- Morgan Freeman
- Stephen Fry
- Gene Hackman
- Tom Hanks
- Dustin Hoffman
- Anthony Hopkins
- Samuel L. Jackson
- Jenna Jameson
- Ron Jeremy
- Pat Kenny
- Nicole Kidman
- Dilip Kumar
- Jet Li
- Art Linkletter
- Christopher Lee
- Jay Leno
- David Letterman
- Sophia Loren
- Steve Martin
- Roger Moore
- Mike Myers
- Jack Nicholson
- Chuck Norris
- Peter O'Toole
- Al Pacino
- Gwyneth Paltrow
- Sean Penn
- Sidney Poitier
- Lynn Redgrave
- Vanessa Redgrave
- Julia Roberts
- Susan Sarandon
- Adam Sandler
- Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Steven Seagal
- Jerry Sienfeld
- Will Smith
- Sissy Spacek
- Howard Stern
- Jon Stewart
- Meryl Streep
- Hilary Swank
- Elizabeth Taylor
- Shirley Temple
- John Travolta
- Ryan Tubridy
- Jean-Claude Van Damme
- Christopher Walken
- Denzel Washington
- Sigourney Weaver
- Robin Williams
- George Clooney
Artists
Animators and cartoonists
- Jim Davis
- Matt Groening
- Frank Miller
- Alan Moore
- Garry Trudeau
- Bill Watterson
Architects
- Frank Gehry
- Oscar Niemeyer
- I. M. Pei
Dancers and choreographers
- Twyla Tharp
- Mikhail Baryshnikov
Fashion
- Giorgio Armani
- John Galliano
- Valentino Garavani
- Hubert de Givenchy
- Marc Jacobs
- Karl Lagerfeld
- Ralph Lauren
- Calvin Klein
- Alexander McQueen
- Vivienne Westwood
- Yohji Yamamoto
Graphics and type designers
- Matthew Carter
- Adrian Frutiger
- Milton Glaser
- Steven Heller
- Zuzana Licko
- Hermann Zapf
Interactive arts and games
- John D. Carmack
- Richard Garriott
- Shigeru Miyamoto
- Sid Meyer
- Peter Molyneux
- John Romero
- Alexey Pajitnov
- Will Wright
Painters and sculptors
- Christo and Jeanne-Claude
- Chuck Close
- Helen Frankenthaler
- Damien Hirst
- David Hockney
- Jenny Holzer
- Jasper Johns
- Frank Stella
- Eva Zeisel
Photographers
- Annie Leibovitz
Other
- Yoko Ono
Athletes
- Michelle Akers
- Gordon Banks
- Franz Beckenbauer
- David Beckham
- Bobby Charlton
- Johan Cruijff
- Eusébio
- Alex Ferguson
- Mia Hamm
- Thierry Henry
- Kevin Keegan
- Marcello Lippi
- Diego Maradona
- Jose Mourinho
- Pelé
- Michel Platini
- Ronaldinho
- Ronaldo
- Alfredo di Stéfano
- Zinedine Zidane
- Dino Zoff
Baseball
- Hank Aaron
- Ernie Banks
- Yogi Berra
- Barry Bonds
- Steve Carlton
- Roger Clemens
- Rickey Henderson
- Reggie Jackson
- Sandy Koufax
- Tommy Lasorda
- Greg Maddux
- Willie Mays
- Stan Musial
- Cal Ripken, Jr.
- Nolan Ryan
- Tom Seaver
- Tom Brady
- Jim Brown
- Dick Butkus
- John Elway
- Brett Favre
- Peyton Manning
- Dan Marino
- Joe Montana
- Jerry Rice
- Barry Sanders
- O. J. Simpson
- Emmitt Smith
- Lawrence Taylor
- Reggie White
Basketball
- Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
- Larry Bird
- Kobe Bryant
- Julius Erving
- Magic Johnson
- Michael Jordan
- Shaquille O'Neal
- Oscar Robertson
- John Stockton
- Dennis Rodman
- Allen Iverson
Ice hockey
- Scotty Bowman
- Martin Brodeur
- Don Cherry
- Ken Dryden
- Phil Esposito
- Wayne Gretzky
- Gordie Howe
- Bobby Hull
- Mario Lemieux
- Mark Messier
- Mike Modano
- Bobby Orr
- Patrick Roy
- Joe Sakic
- Vladislav Tretiak
- Steve Yzerman
Rugby
- Paul O'Connell
- Brian O'Driscoll
- Ronan O'Gara
Cricket
- Ricky Ponting
- Sachin Tendulkar
- Viv Richards
- Glenn McGrath
- Brian Lara
- Muttiah Muralitharan
- Sir Garfield Sobers
Tennis
- Andre Agassi
- Björn Borg
- Margaret Court
- Roger Federer
- Steffi Graf
- Billie Jean King
- Rod Laver
- John McEnroe
- Martina Navratilova
- Pete Sampras
- Serena Williams
Golf
- Pádraig Harrington
- Jack Nicklaus
- Greg Norman
- Arnold Palmer
- Gary Player
- Annika Sörenstam
- Tom Watson
- Kathy Whitworth
- Tiger Woods
- Mickey Wright
Gaelic Games
- Peter Canavan
- DJ Carey
- Eddie Keher
- Christy Ring
- Henry Shefflin
Olympians
- Evelyn Ashford
- Roger Bannister
- Bonnie Blair
- Usain Bolt
- Nadia Comăneci
- Peggy Fleming
- Haile Gebrselassie
- Hicham El Guerrouj
- Janet Evans
- Michael Johnson
- Marion Jones
- Olga Korbut
- Michelle Kwan
- Pat McCormick
- Shannon Miller
- Michael Phelps
- Paula Radcliffe
- Steve Redgrave
- Mary Lou Retton
- Michelle Smith
- Mark Spitz
- Ian Thorpe
Professional wrestling
- Steve Austin
- Ric Flair
- Hulk Hogan
- Dwayne Johnson
- Vince McMahon
Boxing
- Muhammad Ali
- George Foreman
- Joe Frazier
- Evander Holyfield
- Mike Tyson
Other
- Lance Armstrong
- Jeff Gordon
- Garry Kasparov
- Danica Patrick
Writers
- Chinua Achebe
- Cecelia Ahern
- Edward Albee
- Mitch Albom
- Maya Angelou
- Margaret Atwood
- David Attenborough
- Maeve Binchy
- Ray Bradbury
- Peter Carey (novelist)
- Tom Clancy
- Bryce Courtenay
- John Maxwell Coetzee
- Joan Didion
- Jules Feiffer
- Lawrence Ferlinghetti
- Gabriel García Márquez
- Günter Grass
- John Grisham
- Seamus Heaney
- Thomas Keneally
- Marian Keyes
- Stephen King
- Doris Lessing
- Colleen McCullough
- David McCullough
- John Montague (poet)
- Toni Morrison
- V. S. Naipaul
- Joyce Carol Oates
- Thomas Pynchon
- Philip Roth
- J. K. Rowling
- Salman Rushdie
- Danielle Steel
- Gore Vidal
- Elie Wiesel
Journalists
- Christiane Amanpour
- Carl Bernstein
- Charlie Bird
- Tom Brokaw
- Bob Costas
- Robert Fisk
- Jason O'Toole (journalist)
- Dan Rather
- Bob Woodward
Composers and musicians
Rock, punk, alternative
- AC/DC
- Aerosmith
- Steven Tyler
- Joe Perry
- The Beatles
- Paul McCartney
- Ringo Starr
- Jeff Beck
- Chuck Berry
- David Bowie
- Ian Brown
- Chris de Burgh
- Eric Clapton
- The Clash
- Alice Cooper
- Elvis Costello
- Pink Floyd
- Roger Waters
- David Gilmour
- Nick Mason
- Glen Hansard
- Chrissie Hynde
- John Lydon
- Morrissey
- Sinéad O'Connor
- The Rolling Stones
- Mick Jagger
- Keith Richards
- Charlie Watts
- Ronnie Wood
- Mick Taylor
- Bill Wyman
- Grace Slick
- Patti Smith
- Bruce Springsteen
- Michael Stipe
- U2
- Bono
- The Edge
- Adam Clayton
- Larry Mullen, Jr.
- Van Morrison
- Velvet Underground
- John Cale
- Lou Reed
- Maureen Tucker
- Paul Weller
- The Who
- Pete Townshend
- Roger Daltrey
- Neil Young
Rap, Hip-hop
- 50 Cent
- Jay-Z
- Dr. Dre
- Nas
- Grandmaster Flash
- Eminem
Pop
- The Beach Boys
- David Byrne
- Cher
- Petula Clark
- The Everly Brothers
- Boy George
- Elton John
- Bette Midler
- Joni Mitchell
- Moby
- Cliff Richard
- Little Richard
- Jessica Simpson
- Britney Spears
- Ronnie Spector
- Barbra Streisand
- Jimmy Webb
- Stevie Wonder
- Robbie Williams
Classical & opera
- Milton Babbitt
- John Barry
- Pierre Boulez
- Philip Glass
- James Levine
- Yo-Yo Ma
- Lorin Maazel
- Kurt Masur
- Ennio Morricone
- Itzhak Perlman
- André Previn
- Leontyne Price
- Steve Reich
- Joan Sutherland
- Kiri Te Kanawa
- John Williams
Jazz, soul, blues, R&B
- Aretha Franklin
- B. B. King
- The Supremes
- Diana Ross
- Mary Wilson (singer)
- Tina Turner
- The Four Tops
- Abdul "Duke" Fakir
- Martha Reeves
- Etta James
- Booker T. Jones
- Smokey Robinson
- Ornette Coleman
Folk, country, funk
- Garth Brooks
- Rosanne Cash
- George Clinton
- Leonard Cohen
- Bob Dylan
- Jerry Lee Lewis
- Dolly Parton
- Simon & Garfunkel
- Art Garfunkel
- Paul Simon
Other
- Enya
- Meredith Monk
- Asha Bhosle
- Lata Mangeshkar
Directors, playwrights, and screenwriters
- Mel Brooks
- Mark Burnett
- Ken Burns
- James Cameron
- John Carpenter
- Ethan Coen
- Joel Coen
- Francis Ford Coppola
- Peter Jackson
- George Lucas
- Sam Mendes
- Hayao Miyazaki
- Martin Scorsese
- Ridley Scott
- Steven Spielberg
- Oliver Stone
- Wachowski Brothers
- Andrew Lloyd Webber
- Shyam Benegal
Entrepreneurs and businesspeople
- Anil Ambani
- Mukesh Ambani
- Jeff Bezos
- Richard Branson
- Sergey Brin
- Michael Bloomberg
- Warren Buffett
- Michael Dell
- Bernard Ebbers
- Lawrence Ellison
- Larry Flynt
- Bill Gates
- Andy Grove
- Carlos Slim Helú
- Steve Jobs
- Stan Lee
- Ingvar Kamprad
- Hugh Hefner
- Carl Icahn
- Robert Metcalfe
- Michael Milken
- Lakshmi Mittal
- Gordon Moore
- Rupert Murdoch
- Denis O'Brien
- Michael O'Leary
- Larry Page
- T. Boone Pickens, Jr.
- Sumner Redstone
- Charles Schwab
- Jeffrey Skilling
- Martha Stewart
- Donald Trump
- Ted Turner
- Jack Welch
- Oprah Winfrey
- Meg Whitman
- Steve Wynn
- Hiroshi Yamauchi
- Muhammad Yunus
Explorers
- Buzz Aldrin
- Neil Armstrong
- John Glenn
- Chuck Yeager
- Ranulph Fiennes
- Andy Green
- Joseph Kittinger
- Reinhold Messner
- Mark Pollock
- E. Lee Spence
- Robert Ballard
Inventors, scientists and mathematicians
- Ralph H. Baer
- Jacque Fresco
- Tim Berners-Lee
- Vint Cerf
- Richard Dawkins
- Freeman Dyson
- Douglas Engelbart
- Charles Geschke
- Jane Goodall
- Brian Greene
- Stephen Hawking
- David Ho
- Bob Kahn
- Dean Kamen
- C. Everett Koop
- Raymond Kurzweil
- Richard Leakey
- Benoît Mandelbrot
- Marvin Minsky
- John Forbes Nash
- Jakob Nielsen
- Richard Stallman
- Linus Torvalds
- Stephen Pinker
- Grigori Perelman
- Gene Spafford
- Ivan Sutherland
- Dennis Ritchie
- Ken Thompson
- Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Craig Venter
- John Warnock
- James D. Watson
- Andrew Wiles
- Niklaus Wirth
Philosophers, jurists, social scientists
- Kenneth Arrow
- Gary Becker
- Judith Butler
- Ronald Coase
- Noam Chomsky
- Alan Dershowitz
- René Girard
- Ruth Bader Ginsburg
- Jürgen Habermas
- Paul Krugman
- Ernesto Laclau
- Lawrence Lessig
- Alasdair MacIntyre
- Charles Murray
- Sandra Day O'Connor
- Seymour Papert
- Richard Posner
- Robert D. Putnam
- Paul Samuelson
- Joseph E. Stiglitz
- Amartya Sen
- Robert Solow
- Laurence Tribe
- Slavoj Žižek
Politicians and leaders
European
France
- Jacques Chirac
- Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
- Nicolas Sarkozy
Germany
- Helmut Kohl
- Angela Merkel
- Helmut Schmidt
- Gerhard Schröder
Iceland
- Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir
Ireland
- Bertie Ahern
Italy
- Giuliano Amato
- Giulio Andreotti
- Silvio Berlusconi
- Carlo Azeglio Ciampi
- Francesco Cossiga
- Romano Prodi
- Oscar Luigi Scalfaro
Russia
- Mikhail Gorbachev
- Dmitry Medvedev
- Vladimir Putin
Spain
- José María Aznar
- Juan Carlos I of Spain
- Felipe González
- José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero
Poland
- Wojciech Jaruzelski
- Tadeusz Mazowiecki
- Donald Tusk
- Lech Wałęsa
United Kingdom
- Tony Blair
- Gordon Brown
- John Major
- Margaret Thatcher
- Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
- Prince Charles
Heads of state
- Eddie Fenech Adami
- Valdas Adamkus
- Albert II of Belgium
- Traian Băsescu
- Beatrix of the Netherlands
- Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden
- Dimitris Christofias
- Heinz Fischer
- Ivan Gašparovič
- Henri, Grand Duke of Luxembourg
- Tarja Halonen
- Toomas Hendrik Ilves
- Lech Kaczyński
- Václav Klaus
- Horst Köhler
- Margrethe II of Denmark
- Mary McAleese
- Giorgio Napolitano
- Karolos Papoulias
- Georgi Parvanov
- Mary Robinson
- Aníbal Cavaco Silva
- László Sólyom
- Danilo Türk
- Valdis Zatlers
North American
Canada
- Kim Campbell
- Jean Chrétien
- Joe Clark
- Stephen Harper
- Paul Martin
- Brian Mulroney
- John Turner
Mexico
- Felipe Calderón
- Luis Echeverría
- Miguel de la Madrid
- Carlos Salinas de Gortari
- Ernesto Zedillo
- Vicente Fox
United States
- George H. W. Bush
- George W. Bush
- Jimmy Carter
- Bill Clinton
- Barack Obama
Latin American
Argentina
- Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
- Néstor Kirchner
- Eduardo Duhalde
- Adolfo Rodríguez Saá
- Fernando De La Rua
- Carlos Saul Menem
- Jorge Rafael Videla
- Isabel Martínez de Perón
Brazil
- Fernando Henrique Cardoso
- Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
Bolivia
- Juan Evo Morales Ayma
Cuba
- Fidel Castro
- Raul Castro
Peru
- Alberto Fujimori
Venezuela
- Hugo Chavez
Asian & Oceanian
Australia
- Malcolm Fraser
- Bob Hawke
- John Howard
- Paul Keating
- Kevin Rudd
- Gough Whitlam
New Zealand
- Jim Bolger
- Helen Clark
- Mike Moore
- Geoffrey Palmer
- Jenny Shipley
Indian subcontinent
- Hamid Karzai
- Atal Bihari Vajpayee
- Dr. Manmohan Singh
Middle East
- Benjamin Netanyahu
- Ariel Sharon
- Shimon Peres
- King Abdullah II
- Bashar al-Assad
Other
- Akihito
- Bhumibol Adulyadej
- Hassanal Bolkiah
- Hu Jintao
- Wen Jiabao
- Kim Jong-il
- Junichirō Koizumi
- Mahathir bin Mohamad
- Lee Myung-bak
- Jiang Zemin
- Lee Kuan Yew
African
- Muammar al-Gaddafi
- Omar Hassan al-Bashir
- Joseph Kabila
- Nelson Mandela
- Thabo Mbeki
- Mohammed VI of Morocco
- Hosni Mubarak
- Robert Mugabe
- Girma Wolde-Giorgis
- Umaru Yar'Adua
Other
- Kofi Annan
- Ban Ki-moon
- Boutros Boutros-Ghali
- Javier Pérez de Cuéllar
Religious leaders
- Pope Benedict XVI
- Billy Graham
- Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama
- Patriarch Kirill I of Moscow
- Desmond Tutu
- Rowan Williams
Revolutionaries and activists
- Joan Baez
- Jim Bakker
- Matt Drudge
- Betty Ford
- Bob Geldof
- Al Gore
- Aung San Suu Kyi
- Osama bin Laden
- Rush Limbaugh
- Markos Moulitsas
- Nicholas Negroponte
- Pat Robertson
- Jack Thompson (attorney)
- George Soros
Other
- The last surviving veteran of World War I.
- The last surviving veteran of World War II.
- The last surviving veteran of the Korean War.
- The last surviving veteran of the Spanish Civil War.
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