Yes, I know what you mean F, and at least half agree.

But I know also that fear of failure in achieving perfection can be a crippling demotivational force, too. So recognising that perfection is unattainable can be a liberating force in much human endeavour, which makes the paradoxical pursuit of simple excellence much simpler.

But hey, the weavers spin no yarn I want to dye for!

perfection is the enemy of good A different concept, but with a similar ring, is Gresham's law, in economics (could this be what you recall?): "Bad money drives out good."

That is, where multiple currencies are in use (e.g., a medieval marketplace), one currency may be generally perceived as less reliable or more likely to depreciate in value ("bad money"). Merchants will tend to pay for their expenditures with any bad money they hold (to get rid of it), and to hoard whatever better currency they receive. Eventually all the better currency is hoarded and only bad money is in circulation; it has "driven out the good".

Bingley:

I understand that Navajo blankets are purposely woven with a very visible "error" in them, a point through which evil spirits can escape without doing damage to the sleeper.

TEd

Any roadmap you buy will have at least one deliberate, obscure error, and typically more. The purpose is copyright protection. If someone puts out a copy of your map, but defends by claiming that he produced it independently (by going to the same sources you used), you can refute him by showing that his version has the very same map error you had hidden in your version.

The equivalent, in the counterintelligence community, is the "canary trap", used where one member (identity unknown) of a group is leaking information to the enemy (the "canary" singing). You distribute copies of a document to the group members, but with tiny differences planted among the copies. Later, you can identify your canary by noting precisely which version falls into the enemy's hands.

Could it be "the good is the enemy of the best", which I think comes from one of C. S. Lewis's theological works. The idea being that we often settle for something good when by making just a bit more effort we could get the best.

Bingley

It may have even been a clever, artful way of describing the practice, so it felt like a quote, at least in my deteriorated memory of it.

In preservation, we often see examples of pursuit of perfection leading to loss of "the good." There are often cases where advocates for a building/neighborhood fight so hard to make sure that a architect/developer conforms to an "ideal" solution that the developer in the end decides that it's too much trouble to deal with these people and just demolishes or destroys something that might have been at least marginally preserved if the advocates had been more willing to compromise.

Also, there are cases where a property is so carefully and stringently preserved that it becomes a burden to those entrusted with its care and cannot be enjoyed or even observed by the public due to the fragility of the materials. I am reminded of the Isabella Stewart Gardiner museum in Boston; people certainly enjoy that museum, but a provision in Ms. Gardiner's will states that the arrangement of the exhibits at the museum must remain exactly as they were at her death, or all of the materials must be sold and the profits given to Harvard (as if they need it). This really cramps a curator's style, and the interpretation of the will has been so strict that when several paintings were stolen, the museum was (and still is, IIRC) obliged to exhibit empty frames where those paintings were with little placards in them explaining why they are empty.

Sorry for the long post, I hope it was, at least, good.

Seian-- i hope your still here-- your questions is wonderful- i know we haven't answered it, but.. it interesting to discuss perfection-- is it desirable to seek perfection? is perfection an ideal, that we strive for, knowing it always unattanable, always, just ahead, like the horizon-- unattainable, but pursued.

or, do we by, abanding the desire for perfection, let our standand fall, do we lower our efforts and expectations when we decide, that perfection, being unattainable, is an undesirable goal?

Is good the enemy of the best? or is perfection the enemy of good? are both true? is there some way to to keep our goals set high, with out becoming rigid, and inflexible-- or can we achive a flexible perfection?

i think any rigid standard will, with time, become unworkable. perfection is not static, but dynamic.-- can we consistantly hit a moving target?

"the good is the enemy of the best"

This certainly can work both ways. On the one hand we can have a group rejecting a workable solution because it does not meet their standards for the best and on the other a group defending the mediocre by claiming that the desired goal is unattainable.

I may be way off base here, but I have always understood that deliberately making an error is an homage to God or the gods, in effect saying that the maker of the item is not worthy to rank with the perfection that is God's/gods' alone.
Have also heard that making something perfect would inflame the ancient gods and bring disaster when they wreaked their anger upon the person for the impertinence.

In Chinese and Japanese brush painting a small error is generally found especially in the older masterpieces.

I liked the Native American idea of letting the evil escape mentioned above.

Oh, yes, one last thing ... some maps have a non-existant town, usually on a third class country road (unpaved) and the "town" is the name of the map-creator ... it's an easy way for a cartographer to prove she/he did the map.

i live on a Map mistake street--since its hard to put in errors when you are maping a city like NY-- on one brand of map, my street is shown as a thru street-- but it is a dead end. on an other brand-- the street next to mine is shown as a thru street-- and it too ends in a dead end-- at least to vehicles. there is an informal pedestrian path-- a gulley.

i've been told there is one "mistake" in each borough, but i have never found any of the others, and wouldn't have found this one, except i live on it!

wow has always understood that deliberately making an error is an homage to God or the gods.

Certainly that is the rationale given. I'm just saying how *I would feel if *I were the god being so cavalierly dismissed.

In Chinese and Japanese brush painting a small error is generally found especially in the older masterpieces.

Yes, I came across this in a short story a while back (which is unrelated otherwise to what I am looking for) where the old chinese master left a very great work of his with everything but one eye of the dragon complete. Then the student had the gall to get up the ladder and paint it in. The dragon sprang to life, and killed the student, (possibly others in the way too) and flew off.

Poking at my memory makes me feel that the quote I am looking for did refer to relgious texts as the example, but refered to all writings. And just books. Not rugs or anything else (though very interesting to read up on. Thanks!).

Ali