Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
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Let AI Choose Your Babysitter – Not!
Predictim Halts Launch But Raises Alarms. Who wouldn’t want AI to choose which babysitter you hire? Predictim thought it was such a great idea it staked its business model on it. “Piece of mind for families” is their comforting motto. At Least They’re Honest About Questionable Claims Except their Disclaimer reads like a damned dismissal of…
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Mark’s Review of Thomas Wolfe’s Kingdom Of Speech
My rating: 3 of 5 stars. Sorry. Eloquently argued, though tendentious to the point of screed. Thomas Wolfe eviscerates the theories of Charles Darwin (evolution based on natural selection) and Noam Chomsky (linguistics as an innate language acquisition device that produces a universal grammar). An Informative Lecture I love how it started out, though. As…
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First Experience With A Cover Designer On Fiverr Was Meh
NEEDED A MOCKUP JUST TO SEE HOW IT MIGHT LOOK So…my first experience with a cover designer on Fiverr. In one word: bleh. In good part it was my fault, because I was in a hurry and didn’t want to spend more than $150 Cdn total for all four unique cover designs, which are only…
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Researching Intersex For My Protagonist
Intersex. Non-binary biology. DSD (Differences in Sexual Development). This condition used to be known as “hermaphrodite,” a term that today is considered neither technically accurate nor socially acceptable. The more I find out about it the more I understand why. I chose to give my protagonist intersex biology. Why? For one, it puts them on…
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Some Pros & Cons of HootSuite for Managing My Social Media Posts
So, been using HootSuite for a while to help me centrally manage my social media postings. It’s tagline is, after all, “Manage all your social media in one place.” Thing is I have mixed opinions about this tool. It does enable me to organize my Tweets, Posts and Updates in a more organized way. But…
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How I Increased My Twitter Impressions 2,000% vs. Month Ago
My initial #pre-marketing efforts are bearing fruit. As a novice novelist-in-process I consider Twitter a key social media property. @MarkDSwartz is gaining some traction. Here’s how I increased twitter organic impressions 2,000 percent over a 28 day period, May to June 2017. Not Starting From Scratch Note that I’d worked like crazy with the group…
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Deciding On My Social Media Strategy
Of all the pre-writing promotional tactics at my beck and call, deciding on my social media strategy tops the list. Which for me is kind of a shame, since I’m not thrilled about the constant self-boasting – and artificially polished imagery – that saturates the web. Is this something of a blasphemous statement given the…
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Smiling Children With Down Syndrome On French TV Controversy
The debate about how to represent images of children with Down Syndrome on French TV rages on. “Smiling Down Syndrome Kids Banned from French TV in Case they Offend Post-Abortive Women” by Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D. Nov 24 2016. France’s Conseil d’État (State Council) has confirmed its ban of the award-winning “Dear Future Mom” video from…
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Must Children With Down Syndrome Be Beautiful To Be Accepted?
Down Syndrome Beauty Asher Nash is a beautiful 15 month old child. His parents felt he was so adorable they submitted his photo to a talent agency that was looking for kids to represent OshKosh in advertisements. The agency did not present Asher’s photos to their client. Emails appear to reveal that they were concerned…
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