The Vitruvian Man is not a picture of actual human perfection, but a speculation about what perfection might be. Of course, Thomas et al proved the Vitruvian Man isn't accurate to contemporary or historical body shapes, but I doubt accuracy is what Da Vinci’s intended. Every society has their own shifting standards for bodily perfection, but Da Vinci reinforced his with mathematical perfection. Thomas et al, the physical measurements of more than 65,000 US Air Force recruits were averaged to measure how close the Vitruvian Man’s proportions are to contemporary body shapes. Da Vinci’s figure conforms to geometric structure, but locks us in its steely gaze, capturing both. Where mathematics represents science, logic, reason-art represents subjectivity, expression, and feeling. Mathematics and art have intertwined for millennia, but in the popular conception art is often seen as a kind of opposing force to math. If man can be measured with geometry, what else might be? Yet the carefully considered intersection of these three elements imply a unifying structure glimmering just below the surface of reality. The elements that make up the Vitruvian man are deceptively simple: a human double-exposure in two unnatural postures, a square, and a circle. Even to the untrained eye, the Vitruvian Man looks like the solution to a problem-but what was Da Vinci solving? Da Vinci took notes in mirror writing, a backwards script intended to keep prying eyes at bay, a precursor to the coded language and oblique symbolism of the alchemists. As the art, writings and philosophies of the classical world was mined for its wisdom, translation and analysis became super powers, and no one wants to share their super power. Knowledge truly was power in the Italian Renaissance.