A person who pretends to know more about something than he or she actually knows as a way of impressing or manipulating others: A philosophaster usually claims to have extensive learning about a subject, but that individual actually has only a superficial understanding of the topic.

Philosophaster is a Latin satirical comedy by Robert Burton, so since the play is about someone who pretends to be a philosopher. The term itself has been used in more recent times to refer to a pretender who supposedly has knowledge about philosophy. <