TIMELINE
June 2020 -
- I thought it would be fun to go into photoshop and merge the most powerful figures in the United States to visualize the faces of 5 fictional leaders representing American power in fields of religion, wealth, military, legislation, and education. Apart from the conclusion that the five imaginary humans look almost identical, lots can be inferred from the personal backgrounds of the 100 individuals. While diversity is ultimately an imperfect means to an end of reducing discrimination, the fact that American social and political power is held by essentially the same demographic is certainly thought-provoking.
June 2023 -
- Exactly 3 years after finishing this project, I decided to revisit this project and rebuild the same men with the help of computer vision, which now has phenomenal capacities for facial recognition and reconstruction. This process yields five clearer and more definitive faces. I also ran across tools such as pauldubois98’s FaceMerge2 that would have made my process in 2020 a lot faster.
Both results are displayed.
SPIRITUAL POWER
20 most influential religious figures in the US, according to Newsmax.
Franklin Graham - Samaritan’s Purse
Joel Osteen - Lakewood Church in Houston
Mark Burnett - "The Bible”
Roma Downey - "The Bible”
Cardinal Donald Wuerl - Archbishop of Washington
Rick Warren - Saddleback Evangelical Megachurch
Mike Huckabee - Southern Baptist minister
Jerry Falwell, Jr. - Liberty University
Joyce Meyer - Joyce Meyer Ministries
Pat Robertson - Christian Broadcasting Network
Ronnie Floyd - Southern Baptist Convention
Dr. Richard Land - Southern Evangelical Seminary
The Rev. T.D. Jakes - The Potter’s House
Cardinal Timothy Dolan - Archbishop of New York
John Hagee - Cornerstone Megachurch
Edward Atsinger III - Salem Media Group
Victoria Osteen - Lakewood Church in Houston
Cardinal Raymond Burke - Vatican Supreme Court
Father Jonathan Morris - SiriusXM’s The Catholic Channel
David Lane - Social-Conservative Activist
MONETARY POWER
20 wealthiest individuals in the US, according to Forbes.
Jeff Bezos - Amazon
Bill Gates - Microsoft
Mark Zuckerberg - Facebook
Warren Buffett - Berkshire Hathaway
Steve Ballmer - Microsoft
Larry Ellison - Oracle
Larry Page - Alphabet Inc.
Sergey Brin - Alphabet Inc.
Michael Bloomberg - Bloomberg L.P.
Jim C. Walton - Walmart
Alice Walton - Walmart
Samuel Robson Walton - Walmart
MacKenzie Scott - Amazon
Charles Koch - Koch Industries
Julia Koch - Koch Industries
Elon Musk - Tesla
Phil Knight - Nike
Sheldon Adelson - Las Vegas Sands
Michael Dell - Dell
John Franklin Mars - Mars
MILITARY POWER
20 highest ranked military officials in the US, according to Defense.gov.
Donald Trump - President & Commander in Chief
Mark Esper - Secretary of Defense
Ryan D. McCarthy - Secretary of the Army
Kenneth Braithwaite - Secretary of the Navy
Barbara M. Barrett - Secretary of the Air Force
Mark Milley - Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
James C. McConville - Chief of Staff of the Army
David H. Berger - Commandant of the Marine Corps
David L. Goldfein - Chief of Staff of the Air Force
Karl L. Schultz - Commandant of the Coast Guard
Mike Pence - Vice President
David Norquist - Deputy Secretary of Defense
James E. McPherson - Under Secretary of the Army
Gregory J. Slavonic - Under Secretary of the Navy
Matthew Donovan - Under Secretary of the Air Force
John E. Hyten - Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Joseph M. Martin - Vice Chief of Staff of the Army
Gary L. Thomas - Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps
Stephen W. Wilson - Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force
Charles Ray - Vice Commandant of the Coast Guard
LEGISLATIVE POWER
20 senators with most seniorities in the US, according to Wikipedia.
Patrick Leahy - since January 3, 1975
Chuck Ernest Grassley - since January 3, 1981
Mitch McConnell - since January 3, 1985
Richard Shelby - since January 3, 1987
Dianne Feinstein - since November 4, 1992
Patty Murray - since January 3, 1993
Jim Inhofe - since November 16, 1994
Ron Wyden - since February 6, 1996
Pat Roberts - since January 3, 1997
Dick Durbin - since January 3, 1997
Jack Reed - since January 3, 1997
Susan Collins - since January 3, 1997
Mike Enzi - since Januart 3, 1997
Chuck Schumer - since January 3, 1999
Mike Crapo - since January 3, 1999
Tom Carper - since January 3, 2001
Debbie Stabenow - since January 3, 2001
Maria Cantwell - since January 3, 2001
John Cornyn - since December 2, 2002
Lisa Murkowski - since December 20, 2002
EDUCATIONAL POWER
20 presidents of the best universities in the US, according to U.S. News.
Christopher L. Eisgruber - Princeton University
Lawrence Bacow - Harvard University
Lee Bollinger - Columbia University
Leo Rafael Reif - Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Peter Salovey - Yale University
Marc Tessier-Lavigne - Stanford University
Robert Zimmer - University of Chicago
Amy Gutmann - University of Pennsylvania
Morton O Shapiro - Northwestern University
Vincent Price - Duke University
Ronald J. Daniels - Johns Hopkins University
Thomas Felix Rosenbaum - California Institute of Technology
Phillip J. Hanlon - Dartmouth College
Christina Paxon - Brown University
John I. Jenkins - University of Notre Dame
Nicholas S. Zeppos - Vanderbilt University
Martha E. Pollack - Cornell University
David Leebron - Rice University
Andrew D. Martin - Washington University in St. Louis
Gene D. Block - University of California, Los Angeles