I take the challenge.Destroy a city with a flower, I'd like to see you try.I’m still not convinced about that. Anything can be destructive, given enough intelligence.
A.
This is what I come up, using my limited intelligence:
You give me a flower, and a city. You ask for the flower to destroy the city.
I suppose that the city is inhabited, otherwise it would be just “a bunch of buildingsâ€.
Ok, in order to complete the task, some preparation is needed. (I keep the flower in conservation ready to be used when the time is right.)
I infiltrate the city and start a “rumorâ€, soon to become a “legendâ€, soon to become a “fact†that there is an all-powerful deity that watches all that is happening in the city. There are rules to be followed (I provide the list), otherwise the deity goes mad and will punish them all by destroying the city. There is no obvious danger, because the rules seem easy to follow, at least when each is rationally analyzed.
People are also warned that when the fatal moment comes (because they can’t really follow ALL the rules, by their nature) a very clear sign would be given (guess what’s the sign?), and then the next day the city will be wiped out of the face of the Earth. In time people become obsessed with it because they see the rules are not followed, not well enough anyway.
That alone is not enough, so “somehow†(another “rumorâ€) the leaders of the city come to the conclusion that the best defense is the attack, so they build powerful weapons, not only able to destroy a mere city, but the entire Earth.
Yet the deity, they are told, is so powerful that there is no way to fight it directly. Still, there is a way! If only someone would be intelligent enough to see the obvious solution… (One person’s overgrown pride –with access to the “red button†- would be enough to make him/her accept this “suggestionâ€: The deity would feel defeated if it can’t carry out its prediction, so using all the weapons a moment before the deity is able to act, would leave the deity a frustrated loser, wouldn’t it?)
All is set. At midnight, on top of the plate held by the statue of the deity (yeah, there was also a statue built) a single, very rare, specific and old flower appears (nobody knows how it got there). The deity has spoken!
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Now, if you were going for the “throw the flower against the city to see which one stands†way, then my point was other: Even the most inoffensive object/substance, used intentionally in a destructive way can succeed. Usually by overusing it. You know, too much water makes a flood, too much oxygen (as in pure) makes an explosion, too many flowers thrown over a city would suffocate everything. That kind of thing.
A.