Introduction
A commonly known theory in the present day is the ‘Six Degrees of Separation’. This is the theory that everyone on Planet Earth are at most six (or fewer), steps away from any other person in the world. This opens up the chance of a long chain of friend of friends, with the idea becoming quite the phenomenon. But what data is there to either prove or disprove this idea, it makes compelling viewing.
Conception
The theory was originally set out by Hungarian author Frigyes Karinthy. The theory was first posited in 1929. The idea became even better known in the early 1990s with a play written by John Guare helping popularize the idea. Such has been the impact of the theory, that many have gone to great lengths to either prove or disprove the idea, the following are some of the key contributions.
Post WWI
In the aftermath of World War One, the world was said to be ‘shrinking’. This was in part due to the increasingly optimal designs of cities, neighbourhoods and logistics, but mainly due to the rapid technological advancements. These advancements were slowly making it easier to communicate with people more than ever before.
2003 – Columbia University Project
Ivy League stable Columbia University conducted an experiment among Internet email users in 2003. They set a target of reaching 18 targets across 13 different countries. Despite almost 100,000 people entering, only 0.4% of respondents reached the targets. This suggested that the theory was incorrect.
Duncan Watts
The second offering from Columbia University came from Duncan Watts, a professor. In 2001 he used the Internet to test the validity of this argument. With almost 50,000 senders with 19 targets in 157 countries, the test was set up well. Watts found that the steps between people were most commonly around six. Six. Of all the numbers. This added considerable weight to the validity of the theory.
2007 – Microsoft Messenger
In 2007 Jure Leskovec and Eric Horvitz together examined a large data set regarding instant messages on Microsoft Messenger. The duo analysed a staggering 30 billion conversations among 240 million people. This was the biggest study to date. Indeed, after considerable work, they found the average path length to be six.
Kevin Bacon
Media personality Kevin Bacon was an unlikely source of more interest in this theory. A game focusing on Bacon was created, where the goal was to link Bacon through no more than six connections to another actor. The premise was that it has to be linked to a co-star of any Bacon film. Search-engine juggernaut Google also got in on the act, helping fans of the game search for ‘Bacon numbers’ in their quest for completion of the game.
Judgement
Overall, nearly all of these contributions are linked to the ‘small world phenomenon’, which helps show a logical side to this theory. It is a phenomenal thing to think about – that for instance Barack Obama, current United States of America President, and arguably the most powerful man in the world, is just a maximum of six steps away from us. It is certainly something that is an amazing part of the world we live in. From a real-life perspective, it is common on social networks to find a ‘random’ person, only to find you indeed have a mutual friend with them. This only further strengthens the case that this theory is correct.
Conclusion
Overall, this really is a phenomenon. There have been countless contributions to this field, too many to list here. But the key arguments within this post mostly all agree that the theory is correct. With the continuous improvements in technology, communication will arguably become easier – meaning in the future it is likely this theory will be strengthened. But for now, it certainly seems like a theory worth treating as factual. It is another incredible occurrence in this world.
/MF/
(‘076’)
Millicent Faith 