www.alphadictionary.com

• philosophunculist •

Pronunciation: fi-lê:-sah-fêng-kyê-list • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: A minor or insignificant philosopher, a fake philosopher, a philosophical pretender.

Notes: This word comes with a synonym, philosophuncule, to which we may simply add -ist to get today's word. It is so far a lexical orphan, but we can imagine an array of paronyms paralleling that of any noun on -ist: philosophunculistic, philosophunculically, etc.

In Play: This word may be used somewhat positively: "Hadley is a philosophunculist at a small college in the Panhandle," but most often negatively: "Lucinda Head speaks about life with all the sagacity of the philosophunculist she is."

Word History: Today's amusing Good Word is a borrowing from Latin, combined with an English element: Latin philosoph(us) "philosopher" + English -uncul(e), an Anglicized version of Latin -un-culus, which is a diminutive suffix meaning "small, little" + -ist. Philosophus was borrowed from Greek Philosophos "philosopher, sage", a compound comprising philo(s) "loving" + sophos "skilled, clever, wise". The origin of philos is unknown. One eminent etymologist proposes a PIE word bhilo- "harmonious, friendly", listing German billig 'cheap, reasonable (price)" and Dutch billijk "reasonable (price)", as cognates. The same is true of sophos, though no one has any idea where it comes from. (Now a gracious bow to Professor Kyu Ho Youm of the University of Oregon, a contributor of surprisingly Good Words like today's since 2009.)

Does this open the road to a verb, philosophunculate?

Am I correct in believing the uncul bit is related to that of carbuncle?

Indeed, it does. Carbuncle was borrowed from Latin carbunculus "red gem", originally "a little coal", from carbo, carbonis "coal".

Philosophunculist reminds me of a group of words
formed with the suffix “aster,” such as “poetaster.”
According to Wikipedia:

Used to form diminutive and pejorative nouns, labeling someone pretending to be what they are not.
‎poet + ‎-aster → ‎poetaster (“unskilled poet”)
‎critic + ‎-aster → ‎criticaster (“petty critic”)
‎pillar + ‎-aster → ‎pilaster (“pillar that does not provide support”)

…which in turn reminds me of the targets of Voltaire and Swift and, you get the idea.