Profile

António Damásio is a physician, neurologist, and internationally renowned neuroscientist, known for his pioneering contributions to the understanding of the relationships between the brain, emotions, and rationality. He graduated in Medicine from the University of Lisbon (1969), where he also received his PhD (1973). After beginning his career in Portugal, he moved to the United States, joining the University of Iowa (1975–2005); he is currently the David Dornsife Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology and Philosophy, as well as the Director of the Brain and Creativity Institute, which he founded in 2006, at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

Damásio demonstrated that emotions are essential to reasoning and social behaviour, revolutionizing fields such as psychology and philosophy. His work on consciousness and affect has placed him at the forefront of thought about the brain and the human condition. Among his most influential books are Descartes’ Error (1995), The Feeling of What Happens (2000), Looking for Spinoza (2003), Self Comes to Mind (2010), The Strange Order of Things (2017), and Feeling & Knowing (2020), translated into more than 30 languages.

He is a member of several scientific academies, including the National Academy of Medicine (USA), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the European Academy of Sciences and Arts. He has received numerous awards, such as the Pessoa Prize (1992), the Prince of Asturias Award (2005), the Honda Prize (2010), the Grawemeyer Award (2014), and the Freud Medal (2017). He holds honorary doctorates from over ten national and international universities and was made Grand Officer of the Ordem Militar de Sant’Iago da Espada (1995).