Who is the most famous living person who was born on each continent?

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Matt Larson writes:

Because of your interest in fame [see here, here, here, and, especially, here — ed.], I would be interested in your thoughts on the following questions: who is the most famous living person who was born on each continent?

For North America and Africa, it seems like the answer is clearly Trump and Musk. For Antarctica it must be Emilio Palma, the only person born there to have a wikipedia page.

For South America Messi seems like a very strong contender. I suppose Shakira could be another candidate. Until a couple months ago maybe it was Pope Francis.

Asia, Europe, and Oceania seem tricky. I would guess that Kim Jong-Un has higher name recognition than Modi or Xi. Maybe it’s a Kpop star (Jennie?) or something. For Europe, Putin, Paul McCartney, and Ronaldo come to mind. I have no idea about Oceania, maybe it’s Jacinda Adern or Hugh Jackman, but they’re not very famous.

Maybe Rupert Murdoch is the most famous living person who was born in Oceania? Maybe at one time Mel Gibson but not anymore.

To me, the most interesting thing about this sort of question is not the specific people but rather the measurement issue. How would you define “most famous person”? Perhaps you could consider a hypothetical poll of everyone alive on the planet, where you ask each of them if they’ve heard of person X and you ask them to briefly describe who this person is. (I guess it doesn’t count as fame if someone says they know who you are but they can’t describe anything about you.)

Here are a few other dimensions:

– Changes over time. There might have been a time when Michael Jackson was the most famous living person from North America. Mel Gibson might have been the most famous living Australian at some point.

– Locus of fame: you could be more or less famous in different geographic regions, different age categories, etc.

35 thoughts on “Who is the most famous living person who was born on each continent?”

    • C:

      I guess the most famous living statistician is Nate Silver, although maybe you’re not counting him because he’s a journalist statistician, not an academic statistician. I don’t know who the most famous academic statistician is–maybe David Spiegelhalter, as he was on Desert Island Discs–, but I guess the most renowned is Brad Efron, then maybe Don Rubin and David Donoho. I may well be the worst drummer among all statisticians who’s ever owned a drum set.

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  3. For Oceania you also have Russell Crowe, Margot Robbie, Nicole Kidman. I’d probably put my money on Ms Robbie, especially with the Wuthering Heights adaptation in the cinemas and Barbie a few years back.

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    • I’ll claim Russell Crowe for Zealandia. Along with Melanie Lynskey, Lorde, Sir Peter Jackson,Taika Waititi… I’d go on to All Blacks but they are only “world fameous in New Zealand”.

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      • As far as I know, I’ve never heard of Melanie Lynskey or Taika Waititi.

        I thought “what about ‘The Rock'”, an actor whose real name I had to look up (Dwayne Johnson) and who I know is associated with Samoa in some way (I assumed he was from there)…but he was born in California! His mom is from Samoa though, and her first name is Mataniufeagaimaleata which I think is pretty awesome.

        Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman… they’re pretty famous in the English-speaking world. Russell Crowe, too. But I dunno about global fame.

        Someone on the thread pointed out that people who are famous in India or China automatically have a big leg up. I don’t know a single cricket player, but the internet tells me Pat Cummins is the current Australian cricket captain and is “high-profile in India after World Cups and big IPL performances.” I don’t know what IPL is but tI guess it’s a big deal. Similarly, Kane Williamson is, “for a cricket fan in India, England, or Pakistan, a household name and often mentioned as one of the best batters of his era.”

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        • > Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman… they’re pretty famous in the English-speaking world. Russell Crowe, too.

          Just as much as Russell Crowe!

  6. Hi Andrew:

    An interesting topic as usual. A lot of this depends on the year and the age of the respondent. For example, Michael Jordan was often described as the second-most famous person from Wilmington NC since that was where David Brinkley was from. However, now it is almost certainly the other way around.

    Rodney

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  7. > Maybe Rupert Murdoch is the most famous living person who was born in Oceania? Maybe at one time Mel Gibson but not anymore.

    I wonder if there anyone who know who is Rupert Murdoch but doesn’t know who is Mel Gibson. There may be dozens of actors, athletes, musicians, etc. more famous than Murdoch. Definitely Obama is more famous than Murdoch – it would be much easier to make the case that he is the most famous living person who was born in Oceania,

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        • Carlos:

          Interesting! From the wikipedia article on Oceania:

          The United Nations (UN) has used its own geopolitical definition of Oceania since its foundation in 1947, which utilizes four of the five subregions from the 19th century: Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. This definition consists of discrete political entities and so excludes the Bonin Islands, Hawaii, Clipperton Island, and the Juan Fernández Islands, along with Easter Island, which was annexed by Chile in 1888. It is used in statistical reports, by the International Olympic Committee, and by many atlases.

          But:

          Hawaii had not yet become a U.S. state in 1947, and as such was part of the original UN definition of Oceania. The island states of Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore, and Taiwan, all located within the bounds of the Pacific or associated marginal seas, are excluded from the UN definition. The states of Hong Kong and Malaysia, located in both mainland Asia and marginal seas of the Pacific, are also excluded, as are Brunei, East Timor, and Indonesian New Guinea/Western New Guinea.

          So I guess Hawaii is considered geographically but not politically part of Oceania.

  10. Virat Kohli, the former Indian cricket captain must stake a claim for Asia. I can’t imagine many people in India dont know who he is. Wikipedia suggests he is the most followed Asian indidividual on Instagram with 274M.

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    • But then basketball is apparently the most popular sport in China, so that might put people like Yao Ming in the frame (admittedly a paltry Instagram presence compared to Kohli, but maybe he doesn’t post much… )

      Also, if we were polling the world, then that might put NBA centre Steven Adams in the frame for most famous living person hailing from Oceania?

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  11. I’d love to see a poll like that. YouGov does run approximately that poll on Americans.

    It’s so hard to answer this question without succumbing to one’s own cultural preconceptions. The most famous person in the world must be someone who is very famous in Asia and especially China and India; they might not even be particularly well known in the US or Europe. Someone like Virat Kohli, who could probably walk through an airport in many parts of America without being recognized is plausibly towards the top of a global list just given how many people live in South Asia.

    Reaching for “football” stars who aren’t especially well known in the US (e.g., Ronaldo doesn’t crack the top 1000 here per YouGov) is obviously an effort to counteract American-centric bias in the list above, but I’m pretty skeptical of the idea that footballers can win out globally given the relatively low popularity of the sport in Asia.

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  12. Jeez. This a stats blog and there wasn’t even one attempt to quantify “famous”. One could, for instance, look at the number of social media followers. Regarding the definition of famous that’s either specific to one country or culture or global. One could also use social media followers and the inclusion-exclusion theorem. That is, the total set would be all followers of a famous person and the purpose is to use the theorem to find who has the most (normalized) number of social media followers distributed throughout the most number of countries.

    i have several other ideas. My point: it should be easy to quantify who is famous and who is more famous, and so on.

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    • Sam:

      I agree that measuring these things is important. I’m not sure how easy it is to do, though! I don’t think social-media following is the same as famous. I’m not saying you can’t use this as a measure, I just think it’s a challenging social-science problem to define and measure fame.

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      • Of course! It may not be easy but I do find odd that I was the only one attempted to do so (and which is odd given the sophisticated people who almost always comment on your posts).

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        • Andrew’s thought experiment addressed the definition of “famous”. He’s using what advertisers call “aided recall” by asking people “do you know person X?” The most famous person is defined as the name that attains the maximum responses. If using the alternative of “unaided recall,” we’d ask “who is the most famous person you know?”

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