I have, on occasion, been criticized for using the construction “more perfect,” being told that it is incorrect and illogical. So I was happy to see Bill Poser’s post on the topic.
He defends the phrase on both logical…
… it seems likely that when we say that something is perfect we mean that its degree of perfection falls within a distance d of absolute perfection, where the value of d is contextually determined. This allows us on the one hand to cut d down to 0 by specifying that something is absolutely perfect and on the other hand to talk about things approaching more and less closely to perfection.
and historical grounds:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union…
However, I think he might need to modify his logical argument to take into account the phrase “beyond perfect“!
