"Bruces' Philosophers Song", also known as "The Bruces' Song", is aMonty Python song written and composed byEric Idle^[1] that was a feature of the group's stage appearances and its recordings.

The Bruces' Philosophers Song is sung by The Bruces, stereotypical "ocker" Australians of the period. The Bruces are kitted out inkhakis,slouch hats and acork hat, and are faculty members of the Philosophy Department at the fictional University of Woolamaloo (Woolloomooloo is an inner suburb ofSydney, although there is no university there).

The Bruces themselves first appeared in theBruces sketch which featured in episode 22, "How to Recognise Different Parts of the Body", of the TV showMonty Python's Flying Circus, first broadcast on 24 November 1970. The sketch shows an English academic (played byTerry Jones) coming to a hot and perhaps remote part of Australia and being inducted by the Bruces (John Cleese,Graham Chapman,Eric Idle andMichael Palin) into their Philosophy Department, seemingly located in a simple wooden shack. The Bruces are lounging around a wooden table and soon start drinking cans ofFoster's Lager.

The song was not part of the TV sketch; it first appeared on the Monty Python's 1973 albumMatching Tie and Handkerchief as a coda for the album version of the sketch. The song was subsequently included in most of the Monty Python team's live shows, sometimes as a singalong with musical accompaniment provided by aJew's harp.^[2]

The song's lyrics make a series of scandalous allegations about a number of highly respected philosophers, usually with regard to their capacity or incapacity for imbibingalcoholic drinks.^[3]

The sixth line differs from version to version. While the studio recording onMatching Tie and Handkerchief refers solely to "Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel",^[4] live recordings (included in theMonty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl film and on the albumsLive at Drury Lane andLive at City Center) mention "Schopenhauer andHegel."

All the philosophers whom the song mentions were dead by the time it appeared, apart fromMartin Heidegger.

Philosophers mentioned in the song (in order):

1. Immanuel Kant (a real pissant who was very rarely stable)
2. Martin Heidegger (a boozy beggar who could think you under the table)
3. David Hume (able to out-consume G. W. F. Hegel)
4. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (out-consumed by Hume)
5. Arthur Schopenhauer (in some versions also out-consumed by Hume)
6. Ludwig Wittgenstein (a beery swine who was just as "sloshed", i.e. drunk, as Schlegel)
7. Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel and/orAugust Wilhelm Schlegel (Wittgenstein is alleged be just as sloshed as either of them)
8. Friedrich Nietzsche (particularly knowledgeable about "the raising of the wrist")
9. Socrates (mentioned twice in each refrain: permanently "pissed", i.e. drunk)
10. John Stuart Mill (particularly ill after half a pint of shandy)^[5]
11. Plato (said to regularly consume half a crate of whiskey daily)
12. Aristotle (a bugger for the bottle)
13. Thomas Hobbes (fond of his dram)
14. René Descartes (a drunken fart: "I drink, therefore I am", which is a pun on Descartes' famous philosophical quote: "I think, therefore I am".)
15. Socrates (second mention) (particularly missed, noted as both a lovely little thinker, but a bugger when pissed)

• Monty Python songs
• Songs written by Eric Idle
• Songs about alcohol
• Cultural depictions of philosophers
• Cultural depictions of Australian people
• Cultural depictions of Socrates
• Cultural depictions of Plato
• Cultural depictions of Friedrich Nietzsche
• Cultural depictions of Aristotle
• Cultural depictions of René Descartes
• Songs about writers
• Songs about philosophers
• Songs about real people
• 1973 songs

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from April 2022