User talk:Zelkia1101/Vital people

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Methods: What makes a person vital[edit]

Although there may be certain objective markers of vitality, whether or not I consider an individual to be vital enough to merit inclusion on this list is ultimately a subjective decision. "Vitality" can take on many different but still mutually acceptable meanings precisely because it is a subjective measurement. Therefore, to avoid confusion, I want to briefly set down my ideas on what makes a person vital as well as elucidate the thought process when choosing names for this list.

I consider vitality to be durability in history. Essentially, a person may be said to be vital if their contributions to a certain field of human endeavor-- be it politics, religion, science, music, literature -- last far beyond their death. Vitality is not necessarily fame. Folks like Donald Trump, Taylor Swift, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Barack Obama are doubtless incredibly popular now, but will their work exercise much influence on the generations of politicians, singers and sportsmen that succeed them? It may be simple to say yes right away, but such considerations are difficult to make and fraught with assumptions. For this reason, I avoid adding living people to this list, however tempting it may be, because their legacies are usually unsettled and subject to disruption. There are some living people on this list — to wit Clint Eastwood, Pelé and Bill Gates — who I have added because I consider their legacies to be settled enough to merit inclusion.

Furthermore, what makes someone "vital" varies depending on the field of human endeavor that they represent. A musician is vital for different reasons than a scientist, who is vital for different reasons than a politician. For this reason, a person's vitality has to be measured relative to others in their field. To put it another way, this list isn't of the 500 most influential or vital human beings overall, but instead the 500 most influential human beings within their fields. To illustrate what I mean, I don't think it's controversial to suggest that Francis Crick's contributions to human civilization are far more important than Michael Jackson's music. That said, Crick is not on this list, while Jackson is. Crick's absence can be explained by the presence of 90 other scientists and inventors whose contributions are far more important than his, while Jackson is probably the single most recognized musician around the world. In summary, Francis Crick may be more vital than Michael Jackson in absolute terms, but Jackson is more vital than Crick in relative terms.

All of the people on this share the distinction of having made incredibly important contributions to the field of human endeavor that they represent, contributions which have, crucially, withstood the test of time. Claude Monet has a place here for pioneering impressionism as an art form. Edgar Allen Poe is listed for his contributions to the literary forms of suspense and horror. Alexander Fleming and Edward Jenner are pillar figures in the conquest against disease. Vladimir Lenin is vital for breathing political life into Marxist thought. These people are essentially household names in their fields, so much so that it is difficult to talk about impressionism, horror literature, immunology and 20th century politics without at least a cursory understanding of their contributions.

Popularity is a component in vitality, though it isn't a necessary requirement. An individual must be generally well known, at least within their own field, in order to deserve a place on this list. There are figures on this list that are not as well known as others, but their contributions to human history outweigh their relative obscurity. As an example, William Jones is not a particularly well known figure outside philology and linguistics, but his contributions to those fields more or less birthed the studies of historical and comparative linguistics, and his suggestion that the languages of South Asia and Western Europe were genetically connected was a watershed development in the history of social science. For that reason, William Jones has a place on this list. On the reverse, extraordinary popularity can make up for a lack of technical achievement. For example, Marilyn Monroe was not a particularly innovative actress, but the diffusion of her name and image across popular culture is almost unprecedented, and that earns her a spot on this list.

To wrap up: achievement, influence, and popularity. These three criteria determine whether an individual belongs on this list. Obviously, with only 500 spaces, I have to leave out a lot of vital and notable people. There is a lot of room for give and take. But, in general, I think that all of the people on this list meet all three criteria, or at least excel exceptionally in two of the three.

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