philosophe
1
9.9
- noun
- /ˌfɪləˈsɔf/
- During the Enlightenment, many philosophes promoted the value of scientific inquiry.
- eighteenth-century philosophes
- French philosophes
Examples
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The French philosophe Voltaire championed the use of reason to improve society.
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Voltaire, the skinny French philosophe, had arrived.
Fiction book (1994) -
The French philosophes of the eighteenth century had a big problem.
Academic text (2011) -
But why is the philosophe so astonished by the Neveu's bodily economy?
Academic text (2003) -
The dispute between the philosophe and the Neveu could not be more fundamental, because the latter puts into question the very nature of philosophical discourse.
Academic text (2003) -
The philosophe's remarks concerning the Neveu's unruly gastronomic practices are by no means trivial.
Academic text (2003) -
Marianna profits from Camaleo's wide-ranging intelligence just as she profits from her reading of Hume and the philosophes.
Academic text (1995) -
Thus, the eighteenth-century philosophes had a prospectivist viewpoint, which marked a distinct advance on the medieval thinking Becker attempts to pin on them.
Academic text (2011) -
There was a good deal of interest in Socrates as a symbol of liberal thinking and freedom in the face of tyranny; the philosophes saw him as a predecessor who opposed the superstitious multitudes.
Academic text (1994) -
At first glance, one is tempted to interpret this dialogue as a debate between the philosophe's Cartesian idealism and the Neveu's eighteenth-century materialism.
Academic text (2003)
Surface Forms
Etymology
The word philosophe comes from the Greek parts philo- 'loving' and sophia 'wisdom', so it literally means 'lover of wisdom', like in English philosophy. In the eighteenth century the word was used for French thinkers who used reason and science to try to improve society, which is why a philosophe is an Enlightenment thinker.