Th. (Théodule) Ribot

Born in Guingamp, Brittany, on December 18, 1839, Théodule-Armand Ribot studied at the Lycée de Saint-Brieuc and later entered the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. He first taught philosophy, then gradually became one of the leading figures in the new scientific psychology emerging in France.

Ribot is often described as a founder of scientific psychology in France. He launched the Revue philosophique in 1876, helping create a home for modern psychological research, and later taught at the Sorbonne and the Collège de France. His work was shaped by a strong interest in linking mental life with physiology and illness rather than treating psychology as purely speculative philosophy.

He is best known for books such as Diseases of Memory, along with studies of attention, will, personality, and the emotions. His name remains attached to Ribot's Law, an influential idea about retrograde amnesia suggesting that recent memories are often more vulnerable than older ones. He died in Paris on December 9, 1916.