[T]hough I spend my nights, and dayes, and thoughts, and spirits, and words, and preaching, and writing, upon Princes, and Judges, and Magistrates . . . I have not paid a farthing of my debt to God; I have not praised him, but I have praised them, till not only my selfe, but even they, whom I have so mispraised, are the worse in the sight of God, for my over-praising.

1700, Matthew Prior, Carmen Seculare. for the Year 1700

However, herein lies the anxiety of using the C-bomb. While I am very happy to use it (a little too liberally admittedly) in my everyday parlance, it still feels slightly shocking to see it written down and one is reminded that, for many, it is still the last word in offensiveness.

All of this fits with what the anonymous blogger G2G had to say in his expanded definition of stochastic terrorism: “you heat up the waters and stir the pot, knowing full well that sooner or later a lone wolf will pop up and do the deed. The fact that it will happen is as predictable as the fact that a heated pot of water will eventually boil. But the exact time and place of each incident will remain as random as the appearance of the first bubbles in the boiling pot."