All scientists who contribute something to the knowledge bank are great!

Q: What do people consider in scientists to be treated as great?

Krishna: People. This word can mean

1. common individuals on the street,
2. media men and women who influence the first category and
3. those belonging to the scientific community.

My observation tells me different people can have different definitions for greatness.

But according to popular media, science journalism, and digital platforms, a small circle of historical figures and high-profile science communicators consistently top the lists of the greatest scientists.

If you ask media men, their list would look like this:

Historically celebrated icons in media

Media outlets (such as Discover Magazine, popular science channels, and historical features) routinely elevate figures who combined monumental breakthroughs with cultural mythos:

Albert Einstein: Frequently cited as the quintessential genius of modern physics for his theory of relativity.
Isaac Newton: Revered for laying the groundwork for classical mechanics, gravity, and calculus.
Marie Curie: Celebrated as a pioneer in radioactivity and the first multi-Nobel laureate.
Charles Darwin: Honored for his theory of evolution by natural selection.
Nikola Tesla & Thomas Edison: Frequently spotlighted in media narratives comparing their rivalry and landmark contributions to electricity.
Stephen Hawking: Widely profiled in popular documentaries and news for his work on black holes and cosmology.
Watson and Crick: Who won the 1962 Nobel Prize for Medicine in recognition of their discovery of the DNA double helix structure (Nobody knows about Rosalind Franklin, A.R. Stokes, Maurice Wilkins, John Masson Gulland, Denis Jordan and H.R. Wilson )

Modern Science Communicators & "Media Darlings"

Media organizations also spotlight contemporary researchers and public figures who bridge laboratory science with mass-audience outreach:
Neil deGrasse Tyson: Frequently featured as a modern public face of astrophysics and star of science television.
Jane Goodall: Widely honoured across global media for her lifelong chimpanzee research and environmental conservation.
Brian Cox & Richard Dawkins: Highlighted in mainstream and digital media (such as science journalism rankings by Science Magazine) for high public visibility and digital engagement.

Know what? Fed on this media diet, several people ask me about them and their " greatness".
Common people can't name any other scientist who is not in this list most of the time!

Media hype in science refers to the exaggeration, sensationalism, and over-promotion of research findings or figures by academic institutions, public relations teams, startups, and news outlets.

Why Media Hype Happens

Academic & Career Pressure: Researchers face intense competition for tenure, citations, and career advancement, creating incentives to frame incremental findings as "groundbreaking".
Funding & Commercialization: Securing venture capital, corporate partnerships, or government grants often requires selling an ambitious, near-future vision (common in fields like AI, quantum physics, and biotechnology).
Media Incentives: Mainstream journalism and institutional press offices frequently rely on attention-grabbing headlines, dramatic abstracts, and simplified narratives to drive clicks, viewership, or public funding.

Consequences of Scientific Hype

Public Misinformation: Everyday audiences can be misled about the real-world timeline or safety of new medical treatments, technologies, or environmental risks.
Eroding Trust: When hyped breakthroughs fail to materialize or turn out to be overblown (such as premature claims in biotech or commercial AI), public trust in the broader scientific community suffers.
Distorted Priorities: Excessive focus on sensationalized "flashy" science can starve steady, cumulative, and deeply meaningful research of attention and resources.

Nobody talks about the great scientists whose work saved millions of lives! Or about those who refused to commercialize their work to help the world. Or the ones who helped the man on the street to comprehend correctly and use the fruits of scientific research in the right way and get benefitted by it.

Then strangely the scientific community thinks in a different way.

Rather than just historical polls, contemporary science evaluates "greatness" or impact through Nobel and other prizes, number of publications, quantitative databases like the Stanford–Elsevier World's Top 2% Scientists list or citation-impact indices (such as the h-index), which track how often a researcher's active peers cite their work in peer-reviewed journals.

These grading things too have some flaws and I am not going to discuss them because that becomes too complicated for the common man.

Apart from Nobel Prizes, the common man doesn't know much about the other things on scientists' list.

Sometime back I wrote these articles on greatness of scientists:

the-unknown-scientist-is-great-too

and

why-i-place-these-scientists-a-little-bit-above-others

And this is my view on this issue:
You don’t grade scientists like that. With many flaws in intelligence measurements, how can you decide and grade people? There is no number one, two or three. That’s all! Don’t try to grade them, the effort will be an utter flop.

All scientists who contribute something to the knowledge bank are great. Period!

Q: What determines scientific impact?

Krishna: 

Scientific impact reflects the influence that a finding or publication has on science or on society. Such impact can be short term or long term and it is important not to emphasize one over the other to too great an extent. For instance, a publication that reports positive results from a clinical trial that demonstrates the efficacy of a potential new therapy could have considerable short-term impact, facilitating the development of a new treatment into clinical practice and directly affecting the lives of many individuals. On the other hand, a publication that describes a new concept or mechanism may not have much short-term impact but could transform how researchers think about their fields and drive other research in completely new directions for years or decades to come.