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[MamaLiberty]

This was sent to me in email and I have no idea where it came from. I just thought it might make for an interesting discussion. How do you define these terms, and what is the difference?  I really like the answer from the prize winner, but it doesn't seem to apply to everything.

My first thought was this. "Complete" is when you have reached a goal, to your honest satisfaction.  "Finished" is when you stop working on that goal, complete or not.  What's your definition?

Complete vs Finished

No English dictionary has been able to adequately
explain the difference between these two words.

In a recently held linguistic competition held in
London and attended by supposedly the best in
the world, Samdar Balgobin, a Guyanese man,
was the clear winner with a standing ovation
which lasted over 5 minutes.

The final question was: How do you explain the
difference between COMPLETE and FINISHED
in a way that is easy to understand? Some people
say there is NO difference between COMPLETE
and FINISHED.

Here is his astute answer.

When you marry the right woman, you are COMPLETE.
When you marry the wrong woman, you are FINISHED,
and when the right one catches you with the wrong one,
you are COMPLETELY FINISHED!!

He won a trip to travel the world in style
and a case of 25 year old Scotch.

[heyoka]

"Ah, women. They make the highs higher and the lows more frequent."
— Friedrich Nietzsche

I'm somewhat reticent to relay this story, due to the cliche factor, but maybe there's someone that hasn't heard it, that might be helped:
Once upon a time, there was a dog sniffing around some railroad tracks. He happened upon a very interesting scent that got his full attention, when a train came along and smashed off the end of his tail.
Hurt and distraught, he was searching for the dismembered appendage between the rails, when another train came and decapitated him.
Poor dog lost his whole head, looking for a little piece of tail......................

[knobster]

 

I have not heard that one!

[Bear]

For a serious answer, I would have said,

"Finished is complete, but complete is not finished. Finished implies that
 no further changes will ever be required, whereas complete does not imply
 that. Complete is done for now, with no promise about the future."

I like his answer better, though.

Bear

[MamaLiberty]

Complete is done for now, with no promise about the future."

How does that work? A circle is complete. You can't take anything away without destroying it, and you can't add anything in the future that makes it more than a complete circle.

It's an interesting puzzle.

[heyoka]

Whats the difference between marriage and death?

dead guys don't wish they were married

[Bear]

Complete is done for now, with no promise about the future."

How does that work? A circle is complete. You can't take anything away without destroying it, and you can't add anything in the future that makes it more than a complete circle.

It's an interesting puzzle.

Suppose I've built a widget, and all of the requirements are fulfilled. The
work is complete. However, marketing may get involved and request more
features later, so the work isn't really finished until the product is obsolete.

complete = 'temporarily finished'

Weird but true.

Bear

[Scarmiglione']

My new hand-made wood table is complete.

But it's not finished.

[DiabloLoco]

My new hand-made wood table is complete.

But it's not finished.

But one could also say that it won't be complete until it is finished. Preferably with a nice, deep stain and several coats of polyurethane. Light sanding between coats, of course!

[heyoka]

Finnish are Scandinavian peoples, with views on adolescent nudity that incite righteous indignation in the North Western hemisphere, whilst pleats are uncool, the communist renditions thereof to be avoided in their entirety.

[securitysix]

Finnish are Scandinavian peoples, with views on adolescent nudity that incite righteous indignation in the North Western hemisphere, whilst pleats are uncool, the communist renditions thereof to be avoided in their entirety.

And here I thought a pleat was a particular type of fold or crease made in fabric...

[heyoka]

yup
maybe their retro cool, or some damn thing
what do I know?
wifey doesn't like em in men's pants

[Adventurer, Explorer, Inquiring Mind.]

I get annoyed with such things, because, there are differences based on context.  No differently than the word "person" means something to people who use it conversationally and it means an entirely different thing to legalists and their ilk.  So lets face it, if we wanted an absolute and immutable, unchangeable definition of each, we could say that "based on a certain context" complete could mean something which is in a state of perfection or lacking the need for further addition, while finished, means that something has reached the end of its lifecycle, work cycle or construction cycle.  What is complete, may not be finished, and what is finished, may not be complete when it reaches that state.

Just my ten cents.

[MamaLiberty]

Why be annoyed, DF... nobody was looking for any "one size fits all" answer. It's just a word game, and the different ways people see things is usually very interesting. Lighten up!! Nobody is arguing here.

[Adventurer, Explorer, Inquiring Mind.]

Why be annoyed, DF... nobody was looking for any "one size fits all" answer. It's just a word game, and the different ways people see things is usually very interesting. Lighten up!! Nobody is arguing here.

No, what I mean is that people end up going to prison because, as Comrade Klinton once may have said "depends on what the definition of ... is."  Well, most people get shafted daily because they assume a word means what it doesn't... in that context and scope.  Scope here used in the programming sense of the word.

Lives get ruined because people often think that lawyers are playing word games.  Many just don't realize that indeed lawyers don't just play word games, but they're doing it with people's LIVES.