philosopher

American  

[fi-los-uh-fer] / fɪˈlɒs ə fər /

noun

• philosophers
  plural

1. a person who offers views or theories on profound questions in ethics, metaphysics, logic, and other related fields.

2. a person who is deeply versed in philosophy.

3. a person who establishes the central ideas of some movement, cult, etc.

4. a person who regulates their life, actions, judgments, utterances, etc., by the light of philosophy or reason.

5. a person who is rationally or sensibly calm, especially under trying circumstances.

6. Obsolete. an alchemist or occult scientist.

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philosopher British  

/ fɪˈlɒsəfə /

noun

1. a student, teacher, or devotee of philosophy

2. a person of philosophical temperament, esp one who is patient, wise, and stoical

3. (formerly) an alchemist or devotee of occult science

4. a person who establishes the ideology of a cult or movement

   the philosopher of the revolution

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philosopher Cultural  

1. Someone who engages in philosophy. Some examples of philosophers are Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, and Plato.

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• philosophership
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• philosophers
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of philosopher

First recorded before 900; Middle English, variant of philosophre from Anglo-French ( Middle French philosophe, from Latin philosophus ); replacing Old English philosoph, from Latin philosophus, from Greek philósophos “philosopher,” equivalent to philo- philo- + soph(ía) “wisdom” ( see -sophy) + -os noun suffix

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Explanation

A philosopher is someone engaged in the study of philosophy. Have you ever wondered about the meaning of life? This is the type of weighty question a philosopher tackles. In ancient Greek, the word philosopho meant a “lover of wisdom.” Thales of Miletus, who lived in the 7th century B.C., generally gets credit for being the first western philosopher, though he is much less well known than Socrates, Plato or Aristotle. René Descartes, famous for his declaration, “I think, therefore I am,” is considered the first modern philosopher, though he lived in the 17th century.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

philosopher philosophers

The secretary’s examples of Western heroism were the Spartans at Thermopylae and the philosopher Socrates, both of whom, he said, illustrate the “Western” willingness to “pay any cost for a cause worthy of his loyalty.”

From Salon ● Oct. 13, 2026

Its intellectual roots can be traced to Australian philosopher Peter Singer.

From Barron's ● Oct. 2, 2026

Many of those texts were works by Philodemus, an Epicurean philosopher who lived in Herculaneum roughly a century before Vesuvius erupted.

From Science Daily ● Sep. 26, 2026

He asked you who your favorite philosopher is, and you can’t name one, but then you ask him the same question and he also isn’t able to name one.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 19, 2026

In fact, most people of the time still believed in “spontaneous generation,” a theory put forth by the philosopher Aristotle in 330 B.C., almost two thousand years before Maria’s time.

From "The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science" by Joyce Sidman

By creating a miniature universe from just 24,000 atoms, researchers have gained a new experimental tool for investigating a question that has challenged physicists and philosophers for centuries: What makes time flow?

From Science Daily ● Oct. 30, 2026

These are questions that researchers and philosophers — inside as well as outside of tech circles — are grappling with as the capabilities of AI models improve.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 24, 2026

Two years later, Oxford University philosophers William MacAskill and Toby Ord launched "Giving What We Can," encouraging people to donate at least 10 percent of their income to tackling global poverty.

From Barron's ● Oct. 2, 2026

The pledge was created by Oxford philosophers Toby Ord and Will MacAskill, who in 2011 helped coin the term “effective altruism,” or EA.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 27, 2026

The question of “likeness” had preoccupied scientists and philosophers for centuries.

From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee

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