THE BEST MUSE FOR THESE TIMES IS…

The millions of Egyptians on Feb. 11 who were gathered when Mubarak decided to leave. —Alaa Al Aswany

Mohamed Bouazizi. —Mohamed ElBaradei

The chanting of Syrian protesters: people want to topple the regime. —Razan Zaitouneh

The voice of the youth. —Wadah Khanfar

Gandhi. —Eman Al Nafjan

Seeing peaceful demonstration and civil disobedience succeed in bringing down dictatorships. —Manal al-Sharif

Desmond Tutu. —Srdja Popovic

Mahatma Gandhi; simplicity in life, morality in character. —Azim Premji

My wife and son. —Daniel Domscheit-Berg

Optimism. —Gene Cretz

Caïssa. —Kenneth Rogoff

Steve Jobs. —Salam Fayyad

Natalie Portman. —Mizuho Fukushima

Jessica Alba, especially in Dark Angel. —Yuichi Kaido

Lady Gaga. —Nouriel Roubini

Tariq Jahan, the grieving father who called for peace and tolerance just hours after his son was killed in the Birmingham riots this summer. —Amy Chua

Seamus McGraw, author of The End of Country (2011). —Terry Engelder

That we should have faith in this country's future and gain inspiration from its past. —Gary Lash

The Rolling Stones. After all, you can't always get what you want. —Paul Ryan

Yogi Berra: "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." —Robert Zoellick

Clio. —Edward Glaeser

Keynes. —Saskia Sassen

The courage of the nameless protester against tyranny. —David Scheffer

Steve Jobs, with his knowledge and knife-edged mind, followed closely by a woman, any woman, as ayatollah or pope. —Sherry Rehman

Statisticians. —Steven Pinker

Thomas Merton. —Andrew Sullivan

Pollyanna: someone has to stay optimistic. —Gareth Evans

William Shakespeare. —Martin Wolf

Martin Wolf. —Paul Collier

Voltaire: His combination of reason and skepticism, tempered with irony and hope, will help keep us sane. —Abhijit Banerjee

Twitter. —Mikko Hypponen

The Internet. —Herman Chinery-Hesse

Open. —Joseph Nye

Bob Dylan (the times they are a-changin'). —Nancy Birdsall

Aimee Mann. —Barry Eichengreen

The yearning for dignity and justice in the developing world. —Robert D. Kaplan

Honest self-reflection. —Bruce Bueno de Mesquita

The people of Japan, for their resilience and dignity in coping with the aftermath of the devastating tsunami. —Zaha Hadid

Foreign Policy magazine? —Tyler Cowen

Vaclav Havel. —Ethan Zuckerman

As always, rationality. —Bjorn Lomborg

My family. —Cem Özdemir

Warren Buffett. —Deepa Narayan

The freedom brought by new technologies. —Yoani Sánchez

It would be a bipartisan commission chaired by FDR and Reagan. —Jared Cohen

Theodore Roosevelt. —Alec Ross

The Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions. —Mustafa Barghouti

Our planet is sick, losing the wealth of life forms gifted by its countless ages. Yet humans insist on placing their economy at the center of the universe, forgetting that without the biosphere there can be atoms but no life. —Pervez Hoodbhoy

To meditate and clear the mind. —Andy Sumner

Inequality rules, and the youth shall define both what it means and how it will shape the future. —John Githongo

FDR. —Paul Farmer.

Franklin Roosevelt, for continually learning and adapting to change. —Anne-Marie Slaughter

Niccolo Machiavelli. —Kishore Mahbubani

Still Springsteen. —Lant Pritchett

Lady Gaga. —Mari Kuraishi

As for all times, Mahatma Gandhi. —Arvind Subramanian

John Stuart Mill, On Liberty. —Rick Falkvinge

Calliope. —Stéphane Hessel

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