Linus Torvalds is not a computer scientist. He is a (very skilled and clever) programmer.

Actual computer scientists tend to get substantial credit. Lamport, Knuth, & Wirth are comparable to Feynman in how they are viewed, & Turing and Godel are compared to Einstein (for good reason! Godel is arguably more original and impactful than Einstein with regard to the state of science, having demolished long-standing assumptions in mathematics, and though Turing was clearly both clever and original, Turing’s most important work — the universal turing machine — is ultimately an attempt to reframe Godel’s already-famous proofs in a way that non-mathematicians can understand.)

Linus Torvalds didn’t actually create a new system (intentionally). He made a clone of an already existing system (UNIX) that became extremely popular because it filled the need for free unixes on PC hardware marginally earlier than PCBSD did. This is important but it doesn’t put him in the same box as a scientist or a researcher. It puts him in the same box as Henry Ford (who is mostly important for making a substantially crappier and cheaper version of existing automobile technology, and thereby creating a big market for cars).