A trait that people have is we have this expectation and desire that things needs to be “perfect”. It’s almost like another intuitive aspect of us, similar to having an innate sense of objective morality. And when things are not “perfect”, we have an uneasiness about it.
We see this with Christian’s view of the Bible where it must be perfect, so therefore it must be inerrant. As I’ve argued, though I believe the Bible is authoritative and true, we should abandon an inerrant view of the Bible.
We see this in Christian arguments (and even skeptic arguments) for God, where it’s claimed God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, omniperfect, etc.
We see this is in views of the universe. The Greeks believed the heavenly ream must be “perfect”. And the perfect shape was circular. So, all things in the heavens must exist and move in a circular fashion.
The ancient Greeks developed, over a period of centuries, an elaborate cosmology. By cosmology is meant the structure and the origin of the universe. The earliest views, going back to the time of Homer and Hesiod (the 8th century BC) postulated a flat or cylindrical earth located in a hemispherical cosmos that surrounded or envelopped it. But by the time of the thinkers associated with the legendary and mythical Pythagorus (560-480BC, app.), the view became widely accepted that the earth was a sphere in a universe which was itself also fully spherical. This claim was based both on theoretical grounds — (i) the belief that the circle or sphere was the most perfect of geometric shapes, and therefore appropriate for the earth and the cosmos, which were the most important of objects,
https://bertie.ccsu.edu/naturesci/Cosmo … round.html
Aristotle also asserts that the world did not come into being at one point, but that it has existed, unchanged, for all eternity (it had to be that way since it was perfect.
Still, since he believed that the sphere was the most perfect of the geometrical shapes, the universe did have a center (the Earth) and its material part had an edge, which was “gradual” starting in the lunar and ending in the fixed star sphere.
http://homework.uoregon.edu/pub/emj/121 … totle.html
Not only did the Greeks hold to this assumption, but many others as well. So this was a major reason it took a long time for the Ptolemaic view of the universe to be replaced.
The “natural” expectation for ancient societies was that the heavenly bodies (Sun, Moon, planets, and stars) must travel in uniform motion along the most “perfect” path possible, a circle. However, the paths of the Sun, Moon, and planets as observed from Earth are not circular. Ptolemy’s model explained this “imperfection” by postulating that the apparently irregular movements were a combination of several regular circular motions seen in perspective from a stationary Earth.
https://www.britannica.com/science/Ptolemaic-system
Advertisements, entertainment, and social media appeal to this perfection drive in us. We must have perfect looks, so people spent money and time to try to look perfect. We must have perfect lives, so we post how we are happy and successful on social media.
An interesting thing about the Bible is it runs counter to the idea of perfection, but it shows us we are not perfect. Certainly the people in the Bible were not perfect. Major figures in the Bible had flaws, from Adam to Abraham to Moses to David to Solomon to Peter to Paul.
Like objective morality, I think this innate sense and desire for perfection is a result of us being created in the image of God. Only God is perfect and we have this remnant of his nature in us. We have this desire for it, but it cannot be satisfied by anything in this world. There is no perfect wife or husband. There are no perfect kids. There is no perfect bank account. There is no perfect job. There is no perfect church. There is no perfect life.
There is only one thing perfect – God himself.
https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1139902#p1139902