Six degrees of separation

[Howie]

Six degrees of separation What do you think of this. I kind of get the jist of this, but I can't help but think that any thing involving a census of people cannot be accurate. It can only be an educated guess. Or a well thought out algorithm?

[Ender_]

If you look in this February's issue of Discover magazine, there is an a two or three page article on it. I didn't look at it too much, so I really discuss it. You may want to take a look at the article if you can find the issue. The cover says it is a scam, and I think they said the data was weak. *really can't discuss it I can't edit for some reason, sorry

[ThePhobiaViewed]

Sorry I have absolutely nothing to add, but being a huge Dream Theater fan the title reminded me of their album "Six Degrees of inner Turbulence" and then I bring up the page and Howie's sig looks just like the cover art of the album. Freaky eh?

[Howie]

If you look in this February's issue of Discover magazine, there is an a two or three page article on it. I didn't look at it too much, so I really discuss it. You may want to take a look at the article if you can find the issue. The cover says it is a scam, and I think they said the data was weak. *really can't discuss it I can't edit for some reason, sorry Thanks Ender. I will see if I can find that. It would be hard to prove either way probably. Did you get the editing thing figured out? Sorry I have absolutely nothing to add, but being a huge Dream Theater fan the title reminded me of their album "Six Degrees of inner Turbulence" and then I bring up the page and Howie's sig looks just like the cover art of the album. Freaky eh? Well shit ThePhobiaViewed. There you have it. You actually did add something and didn't even know it. My sig, an album you, me, all variables that would help to make this idea possible. The more variables the bigger the probability gets.

[Luminous]

I can't make up my mind about it. On a related note, have you seen the "six grades of seperation" Facebook group? It's apparently the biggest Facebook group out there now, with over 4 million members.

[Howie]

I can't make up my mind about it. On a related note, have you seen the "six grades of seperation" Facebook group? It's apparently the biggest Facebook group out there now, with over 4 million members. No this is all relatively new to me actually. My sister has some game with Kevin Bacon. He can be connected in this manner. I think. That's is what sparked my curiosity.

[Carôusoul]

I wonder if i can link to any of y'all via this.

[Spartiate]

I suppose the easiest way would be through politicians. I know somebody who works in politics, he knows a politician who in turn knows a world leader. This guy probably has connections in every country and then you just have to do the same three steps backwards.

[Howie]

I wonder if i can link to any of y'all via this. gOD I hope not!

[Windmills]

hmm, well... I'm 2 or three degrees from claire danes, depending on how you count, so that probably gets me all of hollywood within six, can't be too far from bono or the other political types, who know politicians who all know each other and a lot of other people... so, yeah, I can see how I might be within six degrees to anyone in civilised society... All from a cousin's friend going to school with a famous person.

[dragonoverlord]

I didnt understand what the article was talking about dam im stupid.

[oleander]

I have been fascinated with this since the movie came out and the play. If the theory that was started in 1967 was a cause of such skeptisism; why then not see if it plays out. In todays day and age we have computers. I feel that it is quite possible. I always felt it was possible to attain if you had three good friends. In turn use their aquaintences and so on. I was always fascinated by the each degree of seperation. The theory though states you have to pick a subject that is unknown to you: for example - an unknown person in another country. Someone you never met before. Then you start your journey. They say its possible to meet aquaintence upon aqauintence till you meet your subject. I guess the theory would be easier to actually acheive through computers instead of mail or travel. I don't know but either way - it would be awesome if someone had the time to do it - I would actually enjoy seeing someone try to prove or disprove the theory. I think it would be awesome to meet so many people to meet the unkown that is randomly selected. It takes time to get through each seperation upon the subject picked. What i find amazing is all the people you meet along the way. You would definately have to journal it. Hence through seperation is aquaintences. The list is endless.

[wendylove]

Its just a simple case of probabillity and abit of chaos theory. Isn't it obvious. Saying that it breaks down where a country is really isolated or if you take into account stuff like tribes that don't come into contact with the rest of the world. It can only be an educated guess. Or a well thought out algorithm? I'm pretty sure a computer scientist knows more about this then a layman. Basically, it too do with the fact that there is a exponential growth, that easily reaches the number of people alive today.

[oleander]

Like I said if we are talking algorithm in terms of using an aquaintence as an analogy. Friggen fascinating. The numbers would be endless regardless if you didn't reach your test subject.

[drewmandan]

This is really basic stuff, guys. Entirely intuitive. It's just another kind of fractal. Whenever you need to navigate through a complicated network, it's always a good bet to get to the highest point of heirarchy, and then work back down. A good example of this is the wikipedia game where you try to link a random wiki to Hitler with only blue links on the pages, using the fewest jumps possible. Now, if you were stupid and tried clicking random links until you got to Hitler, then it would take many links. But obviously no one does that. You know what to do, even if you've never thought about it. You go up to country level, go to Germany, and then Hitler will be on that page somewhere. There are also rare cases when going through "war" is faster. But those two paths account for well over 90% of ALL paths to Hitler. Another example is road navigation. If you want to cross the country, you know that you have to try to get to the most major highway possible as soon as possible to minimize travel time (up to traffic) and navigation concerns. This is so intuitively obvious that I don't understand how people can doubt/not understand it.

[Xei]

It's not universally true though, obviously, considering there are some communities who have no contact with the outside world.

[drewmandan]

It's not universally true though, obviously, considering there are some communities who have no contact with the outside world. That's like saying you can't follow hypertext links to an isolated computer, and then saying that disproves the theory behind network pathing... Obviously, the underlying assumption is that the fractal is relatively dense, so that there exists at least one path between any two points in the space. If that wasn't the case, then there's no discussion to be had at all. Like, I know I can't do calculus on oranges. That's why I stick to functions.

[Xei]

I don't personally see how fractals are relevant... But yes, clearly if your conjecture is that each node can be reached via only six edges then an isolated node disproves that conjecture.

[drewmandan]

I don't personally see how fractals are relevant... But yes, clearly if your conjecture is that each node can be reached via only six edges then an isolated node disproves that conjecture. No, you're missing the point. I'm saying that given connectedness, there's an optimal strategy for finding the shortest path that doesn't require global knowledge.