Instant Cultured

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    There exists a fallacy in which for some reason a "smart" person must appreciate opera, classical music, or pull feats of chess mastery. So when one pulls a Flowers for Algernon Syndrome or Uplifted Animal, suddenly the subject starts to quote Shakespeare, rave about a fine old wine, or quip about how modern art makes no sense.

    One problem though, there was no Upgrade Artifact! So somehow becoming smarter gives you all sorts of useful information such as knowledge of language, history, sciences, and for some reason the arts but more than that it forces you to like them.

    Hopefully, in the process of becoming a Dead Horse Trope. This, often results in Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness, Smart People Play Chess, and Smart People Speak the Queen's English. Compare/contrast Screw Learning, I Have Phlebotinum, Wicked Cultured, Cultured Badass, and Southern-Fried Genius.

    Examples of Instant Cultured include:

    Film

    Live Action TV

    • Charles Gunn on Angel, who got a lot of extra culture and knowledge uploaded with his brain upgrade in season 5. (Technically, it wasn't a brain upgrade—it was emphasised that Gunn had the intelligence all along, and all the "upgrade" gave him was the knowledge and memories of a law school education.)

    Literature

    • Detritus in Men At Arms suddenly starts using words he's probably never even heard, let alone remembers. However, since the intelligence was induced by a natural quirk of troll physiology, it's possible that he knew the words but couldn't normally remember them. Trolls are not stupid, but they move to the lowlands and become stupid, because the warm climate slow the working of their silicon brains. When Detritus goes to cold Überwald, he starts getting smarter again. When he's locked in a freezer, he almost figures out a grand unifying theory of everything.
    • Montaigne had plenty to say on this topic in his Essays. It would seem it was his Berserk Button (but he was so politely scathing of it).
    • Zig Zagged in Flowers for Algernon: Played straight and justified in that it takes some time for Charlie to learn and appreciate classical music when his intelligence is increasing. When his mind starts regressing again, he loses all interest in it.

    Western Animation

    • In an early episode of The Simpsons, when Homer and Marge thought Bart was a certified genius they took him to the opera, and he was thoroughly bored.
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