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Daily Telegraph: British brains dominate list of living geniuses

Britain has more living geniuses per head of population than anywhere else in the world, according to a new survey which reveals the country's influence on science, technology, business and the arts.

Almost a quarter of those featured in the list of 100 living geniuses are Britons, including Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the world wide web, [Al Gore, call your lawyer's office. - F.G.] in joint first place, and physicist Stephen Hawking at seven in the list.

British artists and musicians feature heavily, including Brit Art leader Damien Hirst at number 15, poet Seamus Heaney at 26, playwright Harold Pinter at 31, Sir Paul McCartney at 58, David Bowie at 67, Harry Potter author JK Rowling at 83 and filmmaker Ken Russell at 100.

Sir Richard Branson, the head of Virgin Group, at 49, chimpanzee expert Jane Goodall, at 58, and psychologist Dorothy Rowe, at 72, also made the list.

With 24 Britons in the list, the country has generated one living genius per 2.5 million people – a higher proportion than any other country.

The list, compiled by a panel of six experts in creativity and innovation, is jointly topped by Sir Tim and Albert Hofmann, the Swiss scientist who created the drug LSD.

They are followed by George Soros, the American financier and philanthropist, Matt Groening, creator of The Simpsons and Nelson Mandela, the former South African president.

There are also some surprise entrants. Osama Bin Laden ranks at number 43, a spot he shares with Bill Gates, the Microsoft founder and Mohammed Ali, the former world heavyweight boxing champion.

The Americans have 43 geniuses on the list – one per 6.9 million people.

Creators Synectics, a global consultants firm, chose their geniuses by awarding scores out of 10 to each entrant against a number of factors: paradigm shifting; popular acclaim; intellectual power; achievement and cultural importance. The firm emailed 4,000 Britons this summer and asked them to nominate up to 10 living people who they considered geniuses.

They received back 1,100 nominations for individuals in all walks of life, more than 60 per cent of whom were either American or English. Only 60 per cent were still alive.

The panel was then charged with ranking the list in order of genius and to present a resulting shortlist of 100, who were then scored against the five factors.

Nigel Clarke, a managing partner of Synectics UK & Europe, said: "Many people argue that a genius can be defined by their contribution, where it turns conventional thinking on its head.

"I think that Albert Hoffman and Tim Berners-Lee have this in common with the great geniuses of the past.

''Both of them have, in their own way, turned the world that we live in upside down. And it may be that alone that accounts for their acclamation as the world's greatest living geniuses."


1] Albert Hoffman (Swiss)
Chemist

1] Tim Berners-Lee (British)
Computer Scientist

3] George Soros (American)
Investor & Philanthropist

This is as far as any sane man needs to go before realizing this is either a monumental joke or the work of a madman.

4] Matt Groening (American)
Satirist & Animator

I am no fan of Citizen Mandela, but the guy who created The Simpsons?

5] Nelson Mandela (South African)
Politician & Diplomat

5] Frederick Sanger (British)
Chemist

7] Dario Fo (Italian)
Writer & Dramatist

7] Steven Hawking (British)
Physicist

Hawking proves that a fat PR man is worth his weight in gold.

9] Oscar Niemeyer (Brazilian)
Architect

9] Philip Glass (American)
Composer

Glass is tied for ninth? That is just sick.

9] Grigory Perelman (Russian)
Mathematician

12] Andrew Wiles (British)
Mathematician

12] Li Hongzhi (Chinese)
Spiritual Leader

If Citizen Li is not out of Slave China yet, he better start running right now.

12] Ali Javan (Iranian)
Engineer

Same for ol' Ali. Unless he is the Father of the Iranian Bomb, of course. [Don't worry, kiddies, I checked. He is safely ensconced at MIT and is co-inventor of the gas laser.]

15] Brian Eno (British)
Composer

Oy vey!

15] Damian Hirst (British)
Artist

15] Daniel Tammet (British)
Savant & Linguist

18] Nicholson Baker (American)
Writer

Who?

19] Daniel Barenboim (N/A)
Musician

Nobody will claim him.

20] Robert Crumb (American)
Artist

Who's Harry Crumb?

20] Richard Dawkins (British)
Biologist and philosopher

20] Larry Page & Sergey Brin (American)
Publishers

20] Rupert Murdoch (American)
Publisher

Oh, no. He's Australian.

20] Geoffrey Hill (British)
Poet

BTW, there are too damn many ties in this list. Prove you have a pair and pick one!

25] Garry Kasparov (Russian)
Chess Player

Fyodor's endorsed candidate for President of Russia.

26] The Dalai Lama
(Tibetan)
Spiritual Leader

Brave, yes. But a genius?

26] Steven Spielberg
(American)
Film maker

Viva Spielbergo!

26] Hiroshi Ishiguro
(Japanese)
Roboticist


26] Robert Edwards
(British)
Pioneer of IVF treatment

In vitro, nobody can hear you scream...

26] Seamus Heaney (Irish)
Poet

31] Harold Pinter
(British)
Writer & Dramatist

Hee-hee!

32] Flossie Wong-Staal
(Chinese)
Bio-technologist

32] Bobby Fischer (American)
Chess Player

That is just mean.

32] Prince (American)
Musician

HOLY CRAP!

32] Henrik Gorecki (Polish)
Composer

32] Avram Noam Chomski
(American)
Philosopher & linguist

Noam is a commie. It does take a lot of cogitatin' power to reconcile that with one's conscience. Or a lot of booze.

32] Sebastian Thrun (German)
Probabilistic roboticist

32] Nima Arkani Hamed (Canadian)
Physicist

32] Margaret Turnbull
(American)
Astrobiologist

40] Elaine Pagels (American)
Historian

40] Enrique Ostrea (Philippino)
Pediatrics & neonatology

40] Gary Becker (American)
Economist

43] Mohammed Ali (American)
Boxer

Un-be-freakin'-lieveable.

43] Osama Bin Laden (Saudi)
Islamicist

Goat rape is brain food.

43] Bill Gates (American)
Businessman

It takes a genius to sterilize poor women.

43] Philip Roth
(American)
Writer

Dumbass.

43] James West
(American)
Invented the foil electrical microphone

That surely tops M. Ali [#43 above], who only invented the rope-a-dope.

43] Tuan Vo-Dinh (Vietnamese)
Bio-Medical Scientist

49] Brian Wilson (American)
Musician

Oh my. I do believe I just soiled myself.

49] Stevie Wonder (American)
Singer songwriter

It is about time.

49] Vint Cerf (American)
Computer scientist

49] Henry Kissinger (American)
Diplomat and politician

49] Richard Branson (British)
Publicist

49] Pardis Sabeti (Iranian)
Biological anthropologist

We seem to be stuck on 49, kiddies.

49] Jon de Mol (Dutch)
Television producer

49] Meryl Streep (American)
Actress

Kissinger is gonna be pissed.

49] Margaret Attwood (Canadian)
Writer

58] Placido Domingo (Spanish)
Singer

58] John Lasseter (American)
Digital Animator

58] Shunpei Yamazaki (Japanese)
Computer scientist & physicist

58] Jane Goodall (British)
Ethologist & Anthropologist

58] Kirti Narayan Chaudhuri (Indian)
Historian

58] John Goto (British)
Photographer

58] Paul McCartney (British)
Musician

He did get away with murdering one of his "wives", after all. And he portrayed the maimed one as a golddigger. Brilliant!

58] Stephen King (American)
Writer

Dumbass.

58] Leonard Cohen (American)
Poet & musician

Ditto.

67] Aretha Franklin (American)
Musician

Yes!

67] David Bowie (British)
Musician

Another example of British genius.

67] Emily Oster (American)
Economist

67] Steve Wozniak (American)
Engineer and co-founder of Apple Computers

67] Martin Cooper (American)
Inventor of the cell phone

Hmmm...

72] George Lucas (American)
Film maker

72] Niles Rogers (American)
Musician

Hee-hee!

72] Hans Zimmer (German)
Composer

72] John Williams (American)
Composer

72] Annette Baier (New Zealander)
Philosopher

My eyes are glazing over...

72] Dorothy Rowe (British)
Psychologist

72] Ivan Marchuk (Ukrainian)
Artist & sculptor

72] Robin Escovado (American)
Composer

72] Mark Dean (American)
Inventor & computer scientist

72] Rick Rubin (American)
Musician & producer

Please, make it stop!

72] Stan Lee (American)
Publisher

I love Marvel Comics, but Stan must be blushing from head to toe.

83] David Warren (Australian)
Engineer

83] Jon Fosse (Norwegian)
Writer & dramatist

83] Gjertrud Schnackenberg (American)
Poet

She is a genius because she can spell her own name.

83] Graham Linehan (Irish)
Writer & dramatist

83] JK Rowling (British)
Writer

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

83] Ken Russell (British)
Film maker

Blah, blah, blah...

83] Mikhail Timofeyevich Kalashnikov (Russian)
Small arms designer

Cheap, rugged automatic weapons for all the peasants. Definitely genius. Definitely Zardoz.

83] Erich Jarvis (American)
Neurobiologist

91] Chad Varah (British)
Founder of Samaritans

91] Nicolas Hayek (Swiss)
Businessman and founder of Swatch

91] Alastair Hannay (British)
Philosopher

94] Patricia Bath (American)
Ophthalmologist


94] Thomas A. Jackson (American)
Aerospace engineer

94] Dolly Parton (American)
Singer

Now the joke is exposed. Dolly is obviously #44...DD.

94] Morissey (British)
Singer

He's still alive?

94] Michael Eavis (British)
Organiser of Glastonbury

94] Ranulph Fiennes (British)
Adventurer

100] Quentin Tarantino (American)
Filmmaker

He has been promoted from everybody's third favorite foot fetishist to world's #100 genius. That's some serious marketing, baby.