Hang on--are we entirely abandoning virtue ethics here? Or saying that gaining knowledge is not a virtue?

As with the other virtues, does not pursuit of knowledge require effort but generally result in enhancement of pro-social behavior, if only because the behavior is more likely to actually have a positive rather than negative impact? (Yes, I'm using consequentialism to justify my virtue ethics.)

I don't think your claim here is supportable, or at least if it is supportable, it's non-intuitive enough that the reader deserves a robust argument.

If you were to say, "The delusion that being a snob or jerk does not make one a worse person, so long as one has greater knowledge, is not helpful," then I would agree.