God knows there are plenty of ways to dumb yourself down on an airplane — knock back a few $8 Mas Sabroso Margarita mixes, then swipe your credit card for “The Gambler” on demand and you’re off to the races.
But actually boosting your brain power from your 32 inches of legroom? Sort of unheard of.
But now some noggin-joggin’ pros from Chantilly, Va., called The Great Courses have joined up with Virgin America to offer passengers various (and free!) A/V lectures through the airline’s already crowded Red in-flight entertainment console.
It’s Great Courses’ first time sharing its goods in air.
With topics ranging from Ancient Egypt to the art of high-stakes decision making, the infotainment series just launched this past Super Bowl Sunday (Pete Carroll sure as hell could’ve brushed up on the latter course, but I digress).
These lectures come from The Great Courses’ massive 530-title library that they’ve amassed over the last quarter-century (thing-or-two-knower Bill Gates is a fan) in the areas of history, music, science, literature, language, health, nutrition, personal development and whatever else you can nerd out on.
In other words, if you can’t wait for Obama’s free community college plan to kick in, here’s a great way to help get your seatback learnin’ on (and the only way in-flight, as far as we know).
If nothing else, maybe they’ll give you the confidence to tackle those in-flight magazine crosswords with a pen, for a change!
Courses currently on tap:
■ “Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Inexplicable Universe,” from the course, The Inexplicable Universe: Unsolved Mysteries (video)
■ “Cook Like a Pro Chef: Lessons From the Culinary Institute of America” from the course, The Everyday Gourmet: Rediscovering the Lost Art of Cooking (video)
■ “Sneferu – The Pyramid Builder,” from the course, Great Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt
■ “Um, Well, Like, You Know,” from the course, The Secret Life of Words: English Words and Their Origins
■ “Did Slavery Really Cause the Civil War?” from the course, The Skeptic’s Guide to American History
■ “The Enlightenment and an Introduction to the Classical Era,” from the course, How to Listen to and Understand Great Music.
■ “What is Big History?” from the course, Big History: The Big Bang, Life on Earth, and the Rise of Humanity
■ “Junk-Food Monkeys: What Happens When Baboons Eat like Us?” from the course, Being Human: Life Lessons from the Frontiers of Science
■ “Becoming a Spy,” from the course, Espionage and Covert Operations: a Global History
■ “Making High-Stakes Decisions,” from the course, The Art of Critical Decision Making
■ “Not All Carbs Are Created Equal,” from the course, Nutrition Made Clear
■ “Creative Nonfiction: Writing Great Beginnings,” from the course, Writing Creative Nonfiction
■ “How People Respond to Incentives,” from the course, Thinking Like an Economist: A Guide to Rational Decision-Making