In his youth he lived in Lisbon, Portugal, but his experiences under António Salazar's 1933-1974 dictatorship, made him decide to study in a free country.
Between 1986 and 1989 he conducted an original research project on the aesthetics of Fernando Pessoa, at the Collège International de Philosophie, where he directed a program.
The fact that the book was a success enabled the Portuguese to share a public awareness of the problem which may be relevant to helping to solve it.
The following month, December 2004, Le Nouvel Observateur named him one of the 25 Great Thinkers of the contemporary world along with Richard Rorty, Peter Sloterdijk, Toni Negri and Slavoj Žižek.
[1] For several years he has taught courses on aesthetics, Deleuze and Spinoza at Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Department of Philosophy.