Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The property of being perfectible; the property of being susceptible of becoming or being made perfect; specifically, the capability of arriving at perfection in this life, whether a general perfection of the human faculties or Christian perfection.
- noun The doctrine that historical religion will gradually lose its tempoary and local character and be perfected according to the ideal formed by reason. This idea was suggested by Lessing.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The quality or state of being perfectible.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The
possibility of achievingperfection .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the capability of becoming perfect
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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Last week I reread Gulliver's Travels, it's for the chapter I'm writing for the book on breeding the chapter's about the idea of perfectibility, Swift to Godwin, with digressions on horse-breeding and cultural versus genetic perfectibility; Swift really is the most amazing writer, there's no one else like him.
Derek Mahon on Swift's poetry Jenny Davidson 2006
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Where then is the sense of calling the perfectibility of man as used by modern philosophers to be mere words without a meaning, that is mere nonsense.
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Returning to that "perfectibility" argument I was making a couple of weeks ago, Luthor believes he's earned the right to occupy Superman's cultural role--his idea of perfection is defined in terms of power and prestige, and you don't get much more of that than being the U.S.
Week 3: The Not-So-Amazing Story of Luthor-Green and Luthor-Blue! Douglas Wolk 2006
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Returning to that "perfectibility" argument I was making a couple of weeks ago, Luthor believes he's earned the right to occupy Superman's cultural role--his idea of perfection is defined in terms of power and prestige, and you don't get much more of that than being the U.S.
Archive 2006-05-01 Douglas Wolk 2006
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Hogg laughed at him for his belief in the 'perfectibility' of the race, but Hogg knew the belief was vital to the poet.
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Malthus argues that 'perfectibility' gives an impossible end because equality would lead to vice and misery.
The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) James Mill Leslie Stephen 1868
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"perfectibility," which rests on much less impressive evidence.
The Idea of Progress An inguiry into its origin and growth 1894
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But the complexity of his own world view he opposed British involvement in the war but was himself a power-worshiper with a totalitarian itch who believed passionately in human perfectibility charges what might have been a standard-issue Shavian sermon with the multilayered ambiguity of high art.
Smile as the Bomb Goes Off Terry Teachout 2011
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Does his benevolent intention, his belief in "the perfectibility of mankind," mitigate his culpability in any way?
The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein by Peter Ackroyd: Questions 2009
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Sociologists have been seduced by Marxist ideas about the perfectibility of mankind.
ID/Evolution 2009
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