Kansas actually has a better public education system than most other states, including California. People from Kansas would love it if Californians didn't try to tell them how to run their schools or what to feed their kids. Nutrition is almost certainly an emerging science and a laboratory of ideas, and it's a perfect example of why public schools need to remain local, community institutions and not as yet another expansion of the federal government.
I think the problem isn't that the NYT or others don't have good facts. I'm sure they vet their content, or if they don't it's certainly not intentional. The problem is facts may or may not have any valid correlation or reasoning, and can be misinterpreted and misrepresented.
A great example of this (From the 1950s) was when residents in the Northwest started noticing micro-craters on their windshields. The pitting was widespread and many people are interviewed, and it turned out that everyone in the area seemed to have noticed unusually increased pitting on their windshields. Sources indicate that the US Government was also doing atomic testing, that perhaps cosmic rays were involved, and something needed to be done. Not only did this really happen but it turned out to be completely fake news http://www.npr.org/sections/npr-history-dept/2015/05/28/410085713/the-windshield-pitting-mystery-of-1954/ The facts were correct. The sources were credible. But the news was 100% wrong and misleading.
It's not right vs. left, despite what snake oil Facebook or others want to sell. It's a battle of moneyed commercial interests vs the little guy, who may or may not be equally as credible as a large news organization. The problem isn't with us (netizens); the problem is that the print/television establishment is taking over the web and trying to tell us who is credible and who isn't. And shocker- the established news organizations are "real news" and independent media is the "fake news". Who saw that coming?
You don't have to be on the right-wing to be outraged at what is happening (Bernie certainly was). We should all be up in arms against turning the net into gated community.
I like how the socialists automatically think the reason for any monopoly is because of an underregulated system. Not one that is so overburdened and over-regulated that it is impossible to start a tractor company without millions of dollars in lawyers, startup costs, labor expenses, and compliance expenses. If me and three buddies wanted to build and sell tractors without any of that, they would lock us up in jail. That is socialism, not capitalism.
Yep people are naive. Anyone with an aircraft could simply open the window and stick a DSLR out and zoom right in on your backyard. Unlike a "drone" you're going to have no idea it's happening because the person is 2+ miles away and using a zoom lens.
Sure, the barrier to entry has gone down, and unfortunately some really irresponsible people are able to buy something at Walmart and use it to mess with others. But generally speaking, the pandoras box was opened a long time ago. We live in three dimensions and people 'ought to make peace with that new reality.
What if said drone navigates via an INS and gyros, and isn't controlled from the ground but via a pre-programmed flight plan? It sounds like this defense, while probably effective against your average DJI Phantom bought at Walmart, will do nothing to deter someone motivated enough to use a drone as a weapon. Hell, it probably won't even work against drones that don't rely on GPS and are controlled on something other than 2.4Ghz.
Sure, obviously it isn't viable when the government front-loads it with thousands and thousands of regulations to cover the externalities of Nuclear power, when the government does no such thing with Solar or Wind (AKA non-base load generating power). Are they covering the recycling of silicon when they purchase thousands of solar panels? Are they considering the below minimum wage Chinese workers that work in toxic factories to produce your 'green' energy panels? Are they considering the wildlife impact of wiping out hundreds or thousands of square miles to generate a fraction of the energy of a nuclear power plant? The entire system as we know it is a lie, and as they say, turtles all the way down. The only reason things look good on paper is because people have manipulated the numbers for personal benefit.
Yes it is perfectly reasonable to make Holocaust jokes. It's another century, in case that isn't too obvious.
Are we going to outlaw jokes about the American Revolution? Jokes about the Ancient Egyptians? At what point are people not allowed to be offended by something that did not occur in your lifetime and is a part of the history books? This group above is not denying the Holocaust or Nazi-ism. It is a parody.
Perhaps that's the case in Europe, but it almost 100% is not the case in the United States. We whooped some Nazi ass and saved the entirety of modern Europe. I think we are allowed to make some Jew jokes from time to time.
I don't mean to be a contrarian or non-empathetic, but where I come from that's called 'personal responsibility'. Just as it is your responsibility not to set your hand on a hot stove, or not to leap off a cliff, or not to eat poisonous plants, it is your responsibility to conduct business with others who are reputable and safe.
Salary negotiation isn't really that complicated. Know what you're worth, what value you provide, what the industry is willing to pay for that value, and then ask for it without reservation. If, at that point, the potential employer or client is willing to negotiate within those parameters, take it under consideration and figure out what concessions or modifications to the contract you're willing to make to close the deal. It's no different than negotiating for a car, or a house, or anything else.
Farmers don't re-use seeds. You say it's "as old as agriculture itself" but the idea is patently false. Long before GMOs there were seed companies and seeds were purchased for a season. There's no conspiracy here; it's wildly inconvenient to collect seeds and re-plant them, and seeds have been sold in bulk for this purpose for the last 150+ years.
What global warming means is new distribution fights for ressources.
We have had the ability to harness virtually unlimited nuclear energy since the 1950s. Argument 1 â" utterly debunked. If our survival depended on it I'm sure we could chuck a few hippies into the sea and get back on track with fission (As China is already doing on a massive scale). With recent advances in hydroponics and agricultural technology, I'd say we're on track to feed the world of tomorrow no sweat.
Even small, local climate changes by moving trade wind patterns caused civilisations to collapse, accompagnied by war, pandemics and devastation of large regions.
Civilizations have also collapsed over things such as: Taxes, Family Feuds, Middle Management, Bananas, Sexual Insecurity, Poor PR and more! Climate Change in this context is utterly irrelevant. Civilizations come and go all the time.
we face a global war, and we still have overkill capacity -- even if we don't use the nuclear arsenal.
Earth is more peaceful than it's ever been in the history of mankind. Food is cheap and abundant. We've built intelligent machines, travelled to the moon, split the atom, and (With the help of theUS, EU, downfall of USSR, globalization, Internet, etc.), have built a stable, interconnected world such as has never been seen. Why all the damned pessimism? For some reason going from horse and carriage to space travel in 100 years isn't good enough for you guys? I honestly don't get it and it's sad state of things that people have stopped dreaming about the future.
"Fire in a Crowded Theater" was made up in US vs Schenck to argue for the conviction of Charles Schenck, a socialist, because he argued against the draft in WWI. You know, back when we put those filthy socialists in jail, instead of letting them run for president.
I can tell you right off the bat that Fire in a Crowded theater ALSO does not apply as an "exception" to the first amendment. It has no legal standing whatsoever. You could go yell fire in a theater today, if you're feeling up to it, and I guarantee you won't be prosecuted for speech. You'll get arrested for disturbing the peace, perhaps, but it's a free country and you can say whatever you want unless it's BOTH intended to be malicious and blatantly, knowingly false. If you actually thought there was a fire, you would be in the clear, since our legal system operates on INTENT and not what is politically correct or not.
1st Amendment has no exceptions. The closest thing to an exception would be national security secrets (Which, ironically, is partially the fault of Trump's #1 opponent), which we are fighting passionately in the courts right now.
We have actually purchased a NetApp cluster, replicated in two sites, and while I can't divulge what we paid (Plus I'm just the guy who set it up), there's a good chance the parent is off by almost an order of magnitude. Now – I'm not saying you couldn't build your own storage cheaper, or that I have my own issues with NetApp, or that some sort of Cloud solution might not be an even better answer- such as Amazon S3 or Glacier, I will say that a SAN is not at all a bad idea and depending on how important your data is, absolutely worth it. Synology makes great gear but they're in a completely different league compared to something like a NetApp and especially an EMC, just in terms of redundancy (redundant psus, redundant shelves, redundant controllers), support, and performance. It's the same reason banks spend millions to run mainframes even though a new smartphone is probably faster.
Tom Wheeler may have connections and we might hate his guts but it's silly to think that the pittance he donated matters. Obama appointed him for political influence, not money. Money in politics isn't the problem, power is. Thinking that lobbyists buy votes is third grade logic. You sound like the people that claim we go to war for oil. It's a convenient lie for people that can't handle the more complex geopolitical power struggles that keep the system running.
The anti 'Corporate Personhood' argument is extremely misguided, dangerous idea. Corporations are fictitious entities composed of people. Anyone can start one. I have a right under the constitution to assemble a group of people and have my speech protected. What about nonprofits? What about industries that genuinely need their interests represented?
Shouldn't an American manufacturing company be able to lobby against trade agreements with outsourced third-world labor (e.g. China)?
The Supreme Court has ruled time and time again that the system is working as intended. If we take money out of politics the problem won't magically go away. Politicians will still be corrupt, wars will still be waged and the average American will still be thrown under the bus. The only difference is that we slide one step closer to tyranny. The solution isn't to take away money, it's to take away power. We need less government, not more.
As someone who builds model aircraft, multirotors (aka 'drones'), and flies these things as a hobby -- man this video infuriates me.
These guys really think the FAA is going to let a business fly a flying projectile through the middle of San Francisco using Chinese-made hobby-grade equipment, with no formal airworthiness standards and no understanding of why we have federal airspace in the first place? Who's going to be responsible when the thing loses a flight controller and it spins out of control into someone's car/house/child? This video is riddled with technical failings.
The worst part of this is a disturbing trend of: 'Hey, let's just ignore all the real-world problems and make a slick video'. Somewhere along the way, all these kids in San Francisco forgot that you need to put in effort before bragging about something.
We don't need social media affixed to toy helicopters, we need real engineering and hard work.
It's funny, but growers usually know more about lighting than most engineers.
Marijuana plants like direct, intense sunlight. Unfortunately LEDs aren't very scalable. As you increase the current they start to run into physical limitations and the efficiency goes to hell. A 100W led may only put out 50lm/W, where a 1W led could put out 100lm/W.
HIDs are actually extremely efficient (Around 100lm/W) and scalable (bulbs go up to 1kw+). To get and equivalent amount of light out of LEDs with some sense of efficiency, you'd need thousands of them. This may be suitable for plants that can deal with indirect sunlight, but it is not ideal for Cannabis.
There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding of American politics by Europeans. You're not supposed to vote directly for leaders; it's by design.
Even a pure democracy is natural rigged to defer to tyranny of the majority. Voters would simply stop voting for taxes until government was bankrupted out of existence. So yes, in that sense, our representitive democracy is working just fine. The general public is notoriously bad at understanding geopolitics, foreign policy, or the economy. I, for one, do not want a majority of Joe Sixpacks in a room deciding if we go to war or not.
As for our two party system, there are a lot of examples of multi-party systems that are a complete failure (Italy). The prime minister needs a majority in both the Senate and House of Deputies which is nearly impossible, so nothing gets done. Obviously you need some balance between a single party system and a pure democracy, go figure. You'd be surprised how effective a benevolent dictatorship can be (e.g. Pax Romana), so our founders tried their best to come up with a reasonable compromise.
That said, corporations do tend to trip up the system, I'll be honest. The US has lobbying groups and campaign finance problems, but those things too have a valid place in government. A business owner should be able to petition the government! Sometimes the corporation is an expert in a subject that the public is not. There should be ways to reconcile these differences but majority rule or restrictions on free speech are not the answer. Regardless, any path should be tread carefully or we risk removing the very safeguards in government that are designed to protect us from ourselves.
It's a small EPP foam toy flying wing. You can build one for about $150 in parts. I'm astounded that people put the same label to these things and small multicopters that they do to a Predator Drone, for example.
If I were to put my money on something, it wouldn't be a non-redundant system with more single points of failure than your average unpatched Windows XP desktop.
The Earth has a vast history of extinction events, conservation or not. Humans have quite successfully endured by 'shifting locations'.
There's definitely a lot of evidence that low exposure is not dangerous (beneficial...the jury is out). A lot of the wildlife around Chernobyl had dramatically recovered despite high levels of radiation. I don't think this is unusual -- lots of places on Earth see elevated background radiation and we have a history of cosmic events. Most life probably has some yet-to-be-discovered adaptation mechanism.
We know that high levels of radiation are dangerous but statements like "A million people are 1% more likely to get cancer" grind my gears because they're based on a poor model.
The counter-argument is that we've changed a lot less than you think.
Transportation, communication and technology may have changed, the country may be a lot bigger and the world a lot smaller, but human nature goes back thousands of years unchanged. The struggle between large and small government goes right back to the Whigs and the Federalists. Our founders, too, stole lessons and concepts of governance from thousands of years before their time when writing the Constitution.
You could script it to find a certain % match that you're satisfied with. Only catch to this is that it could be a very time-intensive process to scan a huge number of files. Exif might be a faster option which could be cobbled together in Perl pretty quickly, but that wouldn't catch dupes that had their exif stripped or have slight differences due to post-processing.
Why don't people actually work to solve these things instead of whining about how much water we use or fuel we burn? Drought or not, it shouldn't matter one bit. We're overextended and either need to
A) Kill everyone off
or B) Fix the damned problem
Climate change breeds anthrocentrism. The universe is a tough place and we need to fight to survive. Trying to preserve oil or water is no different than putting quotas on how much wood you can burn instead of inventing petrol.
Screw conservation, bring on the technology. Nuclear desalination should have solved this problem 50 years ago.
Slashdot Mirror
Kansas actually has a better public education system than most other states, including California. People from Kansas would love it if Californians didn't try to tell them how to run their schools or what to feed their kids. Nutrition is almost certainly an emerging science and a laboratory of ideas, and it's a perfect example of why public schools need to remain local, community institutions and not as yet another expansion of the federal government.
I think the problem isn't that the NYT or others don't have good facts. I'm sure they vet their content, or if they don't it's certainly not intentional. The problem is facts may or may not have any valid correlation or reasoning, and can be misinterpreted and misrepresented.
A great example of this (From the 1950s) was when residents in the Northwest started noticing micro-craters on their windshields. The pitting was widespread and many people are interviewed, and it turned out that everyone in the area seemed to have noticed unusually increased pitting on their windshields. Sources indicate that the US Government was also doing atomic testing, that perhaps cosmic rays were involved, and something needed to be done. Not only did this really happen but it turned out to be completely fake news http://www.npr.org/sections/npr-history-dept/2015/05/28/410085713/the-windshield-pitting-mystery-of-1954/ The facts were correct. The sources were credible. But the news was 100% wrong and misleading.
It's not right vs. left, despite what snake oil Facebook or others want to sell. It's a battle of moneyed commercial interests vs the little guy, who may or may not be equally as credible as a large news organization. The problem isn't with us (netizens); the problem is that the print/television establishment is taking over the web and trying to tell us who is credible and who isn't. And shocker- the established news organizations are "real news" and independent media is the "fake news". Who saw that coming?
You don't have to be on the right-wing to be outraged at what is happening (Bernie certainly was). We should all be up in arms against turning the net into gated community.
I like how the socialists automatically think the reason for any monopoly is because of an underregulated system. Not one that is so overburdened and over-regulated that it is impossible to start a tractor company without millions of dollars in lawyers, startup costs, labor expenses, and compliance expenses. If me and three buddies wanted to build and sell tractors without any of that, they would lock us up in jail. That is socialism, not capitalism.
Yep people are naive. Anyone with an aircraft could simply open the window and stick a DSLR out and zoom right in on your backyard. Unlike a "drone" you're going to have no idea it's happening because the person is 2+ miles away and using a zoom lens.
Sure, the barrier to entry has gone down, and unfortunately some really irresponsible people are able to buy something at Walmart and use it to mess with others. But generally speaking, the pandoras box was opened a long time ago. We live in three dimensions and people 'ought to make peace with that new reality.
What if said drone navigates via an INS and gyros, and isn't controlled from the ground but via a pre-programmed flight plan? It sounds like this defense, while probably effective against your average DJI Phantom bought at Walmart, will do nothing to deter someone motivated enough to use a drone as a weapon. Hell, it probably won't even work against drones that don't rely on GPS and are controlled on something other than 2.4Ghz.
Sure, obviously it isn't viable when the government front-loads it with thousands and thousands of regulations to cover the externalities of Nuclear power, when the government does no such thing with Solar or Wind (AKA non-base load generating power). Are they covering the recycling of silicon when they purchase thousands of solar panels? Are they considering the below minimum wage Chinese workers that work in toxic factories to produce your 'green' energy panels? Are they considering the wildlife impact of wiping out hundreds or thousands of square miles to generate a fraction of the energy of a nuclear power plant? The entire system as we know it is a lie, and as they say, turtles all the way down. The only reason things look good on paper is because people have manipulated the numbers for personal benefit.
Yes it is perfectly reasonable to make Holocaust jokes. It's another century, in case that isn't too obvious.
Are we going to outlaw jokes about the American Revolution? Jokes about the Ancient Egyptians? At what point are people not allowed to be offended by something that did not occur in your lifetime and is a part of the history books? This group above is not denying the Holocaust or Nazi-ism. It is a parody.
Perhaps that's the case in Europe, but it almost 100% is not the case in the United States. We whooped some Nazi ass and saved the entirety of modern Europe. I think we are allowed to make some Jew jokes from time to time.
I don't mean to be a contrarian or non-empathetic, but where I come from that's called 'personal responsibility'. Just as it is your responsibility not to set your hand on a hot stove, or not to leap off a cliff, or not to eat poisonous plants, it is your responsibility to conduct business with others who are reputable and safe.
Salary negotiation isn't really that complicated. Know what you're worth, what value you provide, what the industry is willing to pay for that value, and then ask for it without reservation. If, at that point, the potential employer or client is willing to negotiate within those parameters, take it under consideration and figure out what concessions or modifications to the contract you're willing to make to close the deal. It's no different than negotiating for a car, or a house, or anything else.
Farmers don't re-use seeds. You say it's "as old as agriculture itself" but the idea is patently false. Long before GMOs there were seed companies and seeds were purchased for a season. There's no conspiracy here; it's wildly inconvenient to collect seeds and re-plant them, and seeds have been sold in bulk for this purpose for the last 150+ years.
What global warming means is new distribution fights for ressources.
We have had the ability to harness virtually unlimited nuclear energy since the 1950s. Argument 1 â" utterly debunked. If our survival depended on it I'm sure we could chuck a few hippies into the sea and get back on track with fission (As China is already doing on a massive scale). With recent advances in hydroponics and agricultural technology, I'd say we're on track to feed the world of tomorrow no sweat.
Even small, local climate changes by moving trade wind patterns caused civilisations to collapse, accompagnied by war, pandemics and devastation of large regions.
Civilizations have also collapsed over things such as: Taxes, Family Feuds, Middle Management, Bananas, Sexual Insecurity, Poor PR and more! Climate Change in this context is utterly irrelevant. Civilizations come and go all the time.
we face a global war, and we still have overkill capacity -- even if we don't use the nuclear arsenal.
Earth is more peaceful than it's ever been in the history of mankind. Food is cheap and abundant. We've built intelligent machines, travelled to the moon, split the atom, and (With the help of theUS, EU, downfall of USSR, globalization, Internet, etc.), have built a stable, interconnected world such as has never been seen. Why all the damned pessimism? For some reason going from horse and carriage to space travel in 100 years isn't good enough for you guys? I honestly don't get it and it's sad state of things that people have stopped dreaming about the future.
"Fire in a Crowded Theater" was made up in US vs Schenck to argue for the conviction of Charles Schenck, a socialist, because he argued against the draft in WWI. You know, back when we put those filthy socialists in jail, instead of letting them run for president.
I can tell you right off the bat that Fire in a Crowded theater ALSO does not apply as an "exception" to the first amendment. It has no legal standing whatsoever. You could go yell fire in a theater today, if you're feeling up to it, and I guarantee you won't be prosecuted for speech. You'll get arrested for disturbing the peace, perhaps, but it's a free country and you can say whatever you want unless it's BOTH intended to be malicious and blatantly, knowingly false. If you actually thought there was a fire, you would be in the clear, since our legal system operates on INTENT and not what is politically correct or not.
1st Amendment has no exceptions. The closest thing to an exception would be national security secrets (Which, ironically, is partially the fault of Trump's #1 opponent), which we are fighting passionately in the courts right now.
We have actually purchased a NetApp cluster, replicated in two sites, and while I can't divulge what we paid (Plus I'm just the guy who set it up), there's a good chance the parent is off by almost an order of magnitude. Now – I'm not saying you couldn't build your own storage cheaper, or that I have my own issues with NetApp, or that some sort of Cloud solution might not be an even better answer- such as Amazon S3 or Glacier, I will say that a SAN is not at all a bad idea and depending on how important your data is, absolutely worth it. Synology makes great gear but they're in a completely different league compared to something like a NetApp and especially an EMC, just in terms of redundancy (redundant psus, redundant shelves, redundant controllers), support, and performance. It's the same reason banks spend millions to run mainframes even though a new smartphone is probably faster.
Tom Wheeler may have connections and we might hate his guts but it's silly to think that the pittance he donated matters. Obama appointed him for political influence, not money. Money in politics isn't the problem, power is. Thinking that lobbyists buy votes is third grade logic. You sound like the people that claim we go to war for oil. It's a convenient lie for people that can't handle the more complex geopolitical power struggles that keep the system running.
The anti 'Corporate Personhood' argument is extremely misguided, dangerous idea. Corporations are fictitious entities composed of people. Anyone can start one. I have a right under the constitution to assemble a group of people and have my speech protected. What about nonprofits? What about industries that genuinely need their interests represented?
Shouldn't an American manufacturing company be able to lobby against trade agreements with outsourced third-world labor (e.g. China)?
The Supreme Court has ruled time and time again that the system is working as intended. If we take money out of politics the problem won't magically go away. Politicians will still be corrupt, wars will still be waged and the average American will still be thrown under the bus. The only difference is that we slide one step closer to tyranny. The solution isn't to take away money, it's to take away power. We need less government, not more.
As someone who builds model aircraft, multirotors (aka 'drones'), and flies these things as a hobby -- man this video infuriates me.
These guys really think the FAA is going to let a business fly a flying projectile through the middle of San Francisco using Chinese-made hobby-grade equipment, with no formal airworthiness standards and no understanding of why we have federal airspace in the first place?
Who's going to be responsible when the thing loses a flight controller and it spins out of control into someone's car/house/child? This video is riddled with technical failings.
The worst part of this is a disturbing trend of: 'Hey, let's just ignore all the real-world problems and make a slick video'. Somewhere along the way, all these kids in San Francisco forgot that you need to put in effort before bragging about something.
We don't need social media affixed to toy helicopters, we need real engineering and hard work.
It's funny, but growers usually know more about lighting than most engineers.
Marijuana plants like direct, intense sunlight. Unfortunately LEDs aren't very scalable. As you increase the current they start to run into physical limitations and the efficiency goes to hell. A 100W led may only put out 50lm/W, where a 1W led could put out 100lm/W.
HIDs are actually extremely efficient (Around 100lm/W) and scalable (bulbs go up to 1kw+). To get and equivalent amount of light out of LEDs with some sense of efficiency, you'd need thousands of them. This may be suitable for plants that can deal with indirect sunlight, but it is not ideal for Cannabis.
There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding of American politics by Europeans. You're not supposed to vote directly for leaders; it's by design.
Even a pure democracy is natural rigged to defer to tyranny of the majority. Voters would simply stop voting for taxes until government was bankrupted out of existence. So yes, in that sense, our representitive democracy is working just fine. The general public is notoriously bad at understanding geopolitics, foreign policy, or the economy. I, for one, do not want a majority of Joe Sixpacks in a room deciding if we go to war or not.
As for our two party system, there are a lot of examples of multi-party systems that are a complete failure (Italy). The prime minister needs a majority in both the Senate and House of Deputies which is nearly impossible, so nothing gets done. Obviously you need some balance between a single party system and a pure democracy, go figure. You'd be surprised how effective a benevolent dictatorship can be (e.g. Pax Romana), so our founders tried their best to come up with a reasonable compromise.
That said, corporations do tend to trip up the system, I'll be honest. The US has lobbying groups and campaign finance problems, but those things too have a valid place in government. A business owner should be able to petition the government! Sometimes the corporation is an expert in a subject that the public is not. There should be ways to reconcile these differences but majority rule or restrictions on free speech are not the answer. Regardless, any path should be tread carefully or we risk removing the very safeguards in government that are designed to protect us from ourselves.
That's not a drone.
It's a small EPP foam toy flying wing. You can build one for about $150 in parts. I'm astounded that people put the same label to these things and small multicopters that they do to a Predator Drone, for example.
If I were to put my money on something, it wouldn't be a non-redundant system with more single points of failure than your average unpatched Windows XP desktop.
The Earth has a vast history of extinction events, conservation or not. Humans have quite successfully endured by 'shifting locations'.
It's all because of the the LNT model
There's definitely a lot of evidence that low exposure is not dangerous (beneficial...the jury is out). A lot of the wildlife around Chernobyl had dramatically recovered despite high levels of radiation. I don't think this is unusual -- lots of places on Earth see elevated background radiation and we have a history of cosmic events. Most life probably has some yet-to-be-discovered adaptation mechanism.
We know that high levels of radiation are dangerous but statements like "A million people are 1% more likely to get cancer" grind my gears because they're based on a poor model.
The counter-argument is that we've changed a lot less than you think.
Transportation, communication and technology may have changed, the country may be a lot bigger and the world a lot smaller, but human nature goes back thousands of years unchanged. The struggle between large and small government goes right back to the Whigs and the Federalists. Our founders, too, stole lessons and concepts of governance from thousands of years before their time when writing the Constitution.
I would try running all the files through ssdeep.
You could script it to find a certain % match that you're satisfied with. Only catch to this is that it could be a very time-intensive process to scan a huge number of files. Exif might be a faster option which could be cobbled together in Perl pretty quickly, but that wouldn't catch dupes that had their exif stripped or have slight differences due to post-processing.
Why don't people actually work to solve these things instead of whining about how much water we use or fuel we burn? Drought or not, it shouldn't matter one bit. We're overextended and either need to
A) Kill everyone off
or
B) Fix the damned problem
Climate change breeds anthrocentrism. The universe is a tough place and we need to fight to survive. Trying to preserve oil or water is no different than putting quotas on how much wood you can burn instead of inventing petrol.
Screw conservation, bring on the technology. Nuclear desalination should have solved this problem 50 years ago.