What`s the difference between perfect and faultless?

I think faultless is a conclusion found through some kind of scrutiny.
Whereas perfect is thrown around much more loosely.

How come your apostrophe is slanted the other way?

I think they are synonyms.

They are synonyms.

Though even between synonyms,
there are minute distinctions.
Otherwise, why not just have one word?

“If you think that you are perfect, people will not find you faultless.”

“Perfect” does carry one connotation that “flawless” does not:

“Perfect” can be used in the sense of “complete”, “whole”, as in perfect flower, (a flower that has both male and female reproductive organs, and so is “complete” in itself).

An “imperfect flower” (one having only female organs) can nevertheless be flawless.

@steelmarket—lurve for your answer. Perfection is not natural, and a snooty perfectionism is certainly a flaw.

“Flawless” is an unambiguous, measurable state observed only in inanimate objects (the Bose wave sound system), certain sporting endeavors (“That was an absolutely flawless triple-gainer, Bob!”), and fashion models’ chiseled and sculpted features. “Perfect” is a subjective, ambiguous state that is entirely relative and different in every application. Classical thinkers use “flawless;” romantic thinkers say, “perfect!”

@Sorceren
But if we say “a perfect circle” or “perfect square”, wouldn’t we be referring to an unambiguous, measurable entity? We would be unlikely to use “flawless” instead.

@Harp, You would be a romantic thinker describing a flawless geometric figure.

Well, when I read something like this…

“The purpose of data fitting is to apply an appropriate algorithm to fit a perfect
geometric form (line, plane, circle, ellipse, cylinder, sphere, cone, etc.) to sampled data
points obtained from the inspection of a manufactured part. The perfect form
approximation obtained through fitting is called a substitute feature.”

…the adjective “romantic” hardly leaps to mind.

@Harp: You had me swooning by “appropriate algorithm.” but I am a cheap date.

@gailcalled Swooning at appropriate algorithm?
Man, you are a cheap date. Speaking of which…
How you doin’?

@Harp—“Classical” and “Romantic” as used in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. If you haven’t read it, I think you ought to. If your cited graf is the kind of stuff you read, you’d absolutely appreciate it more than a romantic thinker would.

Tell you what, that book jerked me out of strictly “romantic” thinking.

The word “perfect” is indeed used in engineering and mathematical applications to describe figures that fit geometric parameters… flawlessly.

@Nimis: Fine, as long as you don’t expect me to share my fries.

What about the San Andreas perfect?

@gailcalled Je n’y avais pas pensé (plus que parfait). Clearly, for the French, perfect isn’t good enough.

@gailcalled I can live with that.
If I can’t help myself, you can always resort to a spray bottle.

@Harp: Parfait

Ca m’est passé sous le nez:

I think that perfect is an ideal. It’s a concept not a reality. It’s rather like the Aristotle’s concept of the Cave….the area outside the Cave is “prefect”...faultless is something that is, to all APPEARANCES without fault. It’s something that can be proven otherwise, rather than an abstract concept.