An essay - perfect.

"Nobody is perfect......... I think....... perfect is boring....." .... written by my schoolmate Vandana Jindal set aflare in me the desire to understand and write about perfection.

Perfection was first featured in its greek version in Delta volume of Metaphysics by Aristotle and distinguishes three meanings of the term, or rather three shades of one meaning. All three attributes of perfection:

1) which is complete — which contains all the requisite parts;

2) which is so good that nothing of the kind could be better;

3) which has attained its purpose

While many philosophers from various cultures went on to define perfection with some variation, the western concept itself underwent a metamorphosis since the greeks to medieval and then to modern philosophy.

Greek thinkers used the greek version of the word perfect for completeness and entirety. Both Parmenides and Melissos saw perfection in existence. A concept adopted by Plato.

In nutshell Aristotle's perfection was chiselled in the Book of Genesis and hence the creation was deemed perfect but not the creator. The reason thus far being that perfection was completeness which could be fractional, but God was considered absolute, devoid of fractional existence and hence the creator could not be termed perfect. God was perceived as neither matter nor spirit nor idea and exceeded any description or praise; it was incomprehensible and ineffable; it was beyond all that we may imagine — including perfection. 

Through medieval philosophy, perfection remained a fractional, non quantacized conept and hence remained excluded from being considered as a property of God.

It was the 17th century philosophy that started characterizing God as perfect as the meaning of perfect started tranforming from analogue (fractional or that which is divisible) to a digital one (quantum states, fractionless states). Hence, phrases like less perfect ceased to exist. It was started by Rene Descartes and was religiously affirmed by Espinoza and then Immanuel Kant. The history of the concept of perfection underwent evolution — from "Nothing in the world is perfect", to "Everything is perfect"; and from "Perfection is not an attribute of God", to "Perfection is an attribute of God.

The paradox of perfection—that imperfection is perfect happened in last couple of centuries as the new quantum and absolute variant of perfection left no room for progress and improvement. This is the reason of evolution of excellence as being one of the states of perfection. Aesthetic perfection started being defined as the little deviation that disturbs a perfect symmetry. An example is a small mole above side of lips, which disturbed the perfect symmetry of a beautiful face is deemed aesthetic. Compare the mole over or above the left or right end of lips to one in the centre (hence maintaining symmetry). Most appreciate the former that disturbs the symmetry than the one which maintains it. Hence, imperfection became perfect. 

Meanings, colloquial and literary, often reflect different perceptions, the same not being limited to English. While I could not research much data on colloquial understanding of perfection historically, I sum up the one in currency as - 

"A state of delivery that fulfills expectations". It has neither to do anything with completeness or with being fit for purpose or being better comparatively (excelling); it is just a state of complete coupling of expectations with delivery. Not without reason does a boss with aweful linguistic skills call a below average written letter as perfect. The below average letter could probably be the best the boss had seen. 

Literary 'perfection' is more complicated. Flawlessness, which is touted in every dictionary as meaning of perfection makes no sense to me. Good definitions should be objective at least within a sensible frame of time. Flaws are themselves subjective. They are a subset of knowledge. Therefore, a flawless design for an amateur might not even be worth a comment by an expert designer. The state of flawlessness or achievement of it by eliminating known errors is not an objective definition for reasons stated above. In a bid to create a generic and objective definition of perfection I express it as:

"The  state of complete coupling/fulfillment of delivery to most excelling expectations, after knowing the state of the art."

State of the art makes the expectations very objective. Once the best is acknowledged, it is easy to define it as the threshold to excellence. The said definition also satisfies all the three attributes of ontological understanding of perfection as stated in Delta of the Memetaphysics.

Aesthetic is that which is considered beautiful by statistically overwhelming majority. Aesthetic perfection remains aesthetic imperfection -  one that disturbs the symmetry - aesthetically!

Author 

Deepak Loomba