I really don't have many destructive urges outside of this; I mean, why ruin someone's work, right? There's just something about a fragile or delicate construction that makes me want to immediately knock it down.
The same compulsion doesn't occur looking at anything that ostensibly appears sturdy. But put me in front of a beautiful sand sculptures or those delicate stacked chocolate displays and I want to become a literal bull in a china shop.
I wonder if there's a fanciful term for this weird compulsion, like the way we have l'appel du vide for the urge to jump off a cliff or if it's just a generic wicked impulse.
Otherwise, I really don't have this urge, so at least we know it's not universal...
That sounds cynical, but I don't mean it that way. If we didn't continually strive to challenge the limits of our might and power, we probably wouldn't be where we are today.
Part of challenging our limits is precisely empirically evaluating the question "is it within my physical power to break this thing?"
And nature gives us a little kick out of it, to make sure we try.
Every time I see one, all I want to do is take one of those stacks and crush it. I haven't ponied up the $3 just to take one home and do it, but the urge is there just the same.
"I can build freestanding structures out of cards (no tape, no glue, no tricks)"
And he has a few pictures of him knocking down some card buildings. I still find it hard to believe there's no glue for some of these... But Wow! Impressive stuff.
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/cardstacker-starter-k...
