Philosophunculist

[Dr. Goodword]

• 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.)

[Slava]

Does this open the road to a verb, philosophunculate?

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

[Dr. Goodword]

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

[MTC]

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.