François Marie Pierre Gonthier Biran was born in Bergerac (France) in 1766. He graduated in civil and canon law at the University of Poitiers. Soldier for a few years, after a period of meditation, and very interested in science, repeatedly travels through northern Europe. He practiced politics as administrator of the department of Dordogne, deputy and state councilor. He died in Paris in 1824.

As Biran was not professionally dedicated to the chair but the administration, his work is typical of a private laboratory in philosophy. It away from the positivism of the so-called pure ideology Condillac school, it will become one of the largest Phenomenologists avant la lettre. No psychologist, physiologist or metaphysical that will not be cared for, understood and refuted by the depth of analysis of Biran.

Among his works are several memories awarded by the European academies and habit influence on the ability to think (1802); Essay on the Decomposition of Thought (1805); and Essay on the fundamentals of psychology and its relations with the study of nature (1812).