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Good morning. We seem to love poll questions that rank people in order, like “Which is the greatest rock group of all time?” The latest, in Prospect Magazine, is on the world’s most important thinkers. They have drawn up a long list of 50 names for people to vote on. The first problem with such polls of course, is that they depend very much on who has the ability to mobilise support. And, how do you judge what is important anyway? The present list contains 17 economists, 13 philosophers, three scientists, an entrepreneur and the pope. 17 economists on the list? I wonder if even one of them predicted the global financial crash we are still living through? But the problem goes much deeper than that. You simply cannot judge between a good orange and a good apple, a good architect and a good cook, a good mother and a good accountant. They are incommensurables. They just don’t go in the same basket. All we can say is that there are different kind of good, different kinds of importance, different kinds of intellectual ability. The last Pope, Benedict XVI for example was an intellectual and sparred on equal terms with the German sociologist Jürgen Habermas, who does appear on the list. The present Pope wouldn’t claim to be one, but he is a rare example radical reformer inspired by the true spirit of Christian poverty. I suppose such absurdity all adds to the gaiety of nations but if we are being serious, the only people who can judge whether a person is an important thinker is someone equally qualified person in the same field. That’s why we have a Royal Society, in which the most distinguished scientists in the country elect new members, and a British Academy where the most distinguished people in the arts elect new fellows. That of course is for our generation only. In the end only history can decide who is of lasting importance .For my money, the greatest ever woman writer in this country, was the 14th century mystic Julian of Norwich and it took 800 years for her true worth to be recognised. Then, beyond history, what is there? What kind of influence reverberates the other side of space and time? Jesus is reported as saying that the first shall be last and the last first. Our human standards of importance will be turned upside down. St Paul, ends a famous passage by saying that so much of what we value, including knowledge will simply vanish “There are three things that last for ever” he said : “faith, hope and love; and the greatest of these three is love.” Love, the ability to focus on the other and their well-being rather than ourselves, that is what lasts for ever.