All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to read nothing

[j4]

Okay, how precisely would you go about committing an act of terrorism using only a paperback book? For the purposes of the exercise, you have to use the physical object, not its informational contents (so e.g. "Buying a paperback book on how to make bombs and following the instructions therein" would be instantly disqualified). You are allowed to pre-prepare the book using other items, but you'll get bonus points for making suggestions which would work with an unprepared book, e.g. the surprisingly unreadable Dan Brown novel that you've just bought in the duty-free.

My favourite suggestion wins a potentially-lethal pair of nailclippers. (I reserve the right not to award the prize if your suggestions all turn out to be variations on a theme of papercuts, but I trust you'll do better than that, won't you, chaps?)

ObMeta-X-spook: Delta Force Semtex $400 million in gold bullion fissionable arrangements Noriega Honduras Ortega assassination Saddam Hussein Qaddafi explosion Kennedy Nazi World Trade Center

Comments

[camellia-uk.livejournal.com]

Ah but the question is, is there any of this stuff that couldn't also be done with, say, pieces of clothing?

I think you see the next obvious step... ;-)

[teleute.livejournal.com]

Then I hope they will either provide extra blankets or put the cabin temperature up a bit...although I suppose we could burn all those books to keep warm ;-)

[pseudomonas.livejournal.com]

I think that might increase the popularity of flying, especially if you get to specify who you're sat next to.

[shaunotd.livejournal.com]

Anything chemical that can be done with paper, can be done with cotton.

[alcina2.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, nitrocellulose clothes might well explode prematurely, as you can't avoid knocking them/ building up static.

In the early days of plastics, celluloid often had a significant amount of nitrocellulose mixed with it, as a result of the manufacturing techniques. There were a number of unfortunate incidents involving shoes and boots made from celluloid, especially when the wearers kicked things hard...

[shaunotd.livejournal.com]

Indeed - ditto early attempts to replace expensive ivory billiards balls with plastics, IIRC