Philosophy

<p ><b>Western philosophy</b>&nbsp;is the&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy" title="Philosophy" >philosophical</a>&nbsp;thought and work of the&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_world" title="Western world" >Western or Occidental world</a>, as distinct from&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_philosophy" title="Eastern philosophy" >Eastern or Oriental philosophies</a>&nbsp;and the varieties of indigenous philosophies.

Historically, the term was recently invented to refer to the philosophical thinking of&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_culture" title="Western culture" >Western civilization</a>, beginning with&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_philosophy" title="Greek philosophy" class="mw-redirect" >Greek philosophy</a>&nbsp;in&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Greece" title="Ancient Greece" >ancient Greece</a>, and eventually covering a large area of the globe. The word&nbsp;<i>philosophy</i>&nbsp;itself originated in ancient Greece:&nbsp;<i>philosophia</i>&nbsp;(φιλοσοφία), literally, "the love of wisdom" (φιλεῖν - philein "to love" and σοφία - sophia "wisdom", in the sense of<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge" title="Knowledge" >knowledge</a>).</p>