Talk:Six degrees of separation

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[edit] Dubious Statistic=

Facebook section claims "As of 6:30 am GMT on March 19, 2008, it had 6 billion people in its database." Surely this is incorrect. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.101.230.50 (talk) 23:49, 31 March 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Game removed

Wikipedia game is an online version of Six degrees using the Wikipedia encyclopedia.

Removed form the article, since it's a self-reference. Still a fun game. -- Netoholic @ 06:22, 2004 Dec 12 (UTC)

[edit] Tool removed

I'm afraid I'm going to remove the automatated (Kate's tool) version too. It no longer works, and there seems little likelihood of it returning any time soon, for policy reasons (ref). -- John Fader 02:00, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)


[edit] Updated description

The very lean description on this site attributed the term Six Degrees of Separation to Stanley Milgram, which is incorrect. I've updated the description with more accurate and fleshier background. -ShashankTripathi 10:16, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)


What about the movie "6 Degrees of Separation" with Will Smith?


Shouldn't "a chain of acquaintances that has no more than four intermediaries." actually say FIVE intermediaries? --216.58.0.55 15:12, 27 April 2006 (UTC)


You're right about the five intermediaries. Six degrees equals five intermediaries. However, the major problem with the current Wikipedia definition of the small world / six degrees of separation theory -- besides the fact that it has clearly been plagiarized from another website, which is bad enough -- is that it completely misinterprets and misstates the theory, missing the point entirely. The theory does NOT state that every person can be connected to every other person by an AVERAGE of six degrees (i.e. through -- on average -- five intermediary acquaintances). This would be fairly unremarkable and not particularly interesting, if you thing about it for a minute. What it states (and this is the essential and controversial point) is that every person can be connected to every other person by a MAXIMUM of six degrees (i.e. through NO MORE THAN five intermediary acquaintances). I'm surprised that this isn't what people are discussing on this talk page. 65.95.126.24 14:50, 2 May 2007 (UTC) Michael Graves 65.95.126.24 14:50, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] practical applications of the theory

The 'six degrees of separation' theory has been practically applied in research as well as problems such as HIV infection among hard to reach populations. You can read about one such application in the Cornell University website http://respondentdrivensampling.org

Another practical application is that you can link George W Bush to any problem in the world, large or small, with at most six connections —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.121.245.155 (talk) 04:31, 5 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Be sure to be really straight forward

Since these are concepts that are "unbelievable" until accepted, we need to make very straightforward conclusions in this article. For example, "Anyone can connect to any person in the world through an average maximum of six mediaries, or, including both you and he, 8 people." Because my wife and I read this and neither of us knew whether the combined total was 6, 7, or 8 people. Second, under genealogy, "So if you can trace your genealogy back on all lines for 32 generations, you have a large enough tree to include a common ancestor with every single person on Earth, including those in extremely remote areas." Anyway, part of my point is the phraseology is a bit abstracted, and part of my point is it's hard to tell when it's referring to 6 generations including you or 6 generations removed from you. I suspect "six degrees" is the latter, and genealogy uses the former; and that may be a problem.

[edit] removed from the article

[revision: 2005/Sep/11: It's actually six intermediaries. That's why it's called 6 degrees.... I in fact once developed a mathematical proof for this (logarithmically), but lost my paper notes.]

--R.Koot 20:25, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] 32 Generations?

Can someone provide a citation for this ridiculous-looking assertion?

I could believe it of a European population, perhaps. But 1200 years for any two humans is utterly absurd, and contradicts the claims at Most recent common ancestor. That article does claim that the MCRA for modern Europeans lived in 1000 AD, which might be the source for this ridiculous 32 generations bit. --Saforrest 15:08, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jerry Root ?

I don't get the Jerry Root thing .. is it a joke ? If it is, I'm not getting it.

[edit] Copyright issue?

This page looks very similar to http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci932596,00.html, which is copyright protected. Is this a copyright issue or - as I hope - not? --badpazzword [registered user but not logged in]

I agree. I don't know what to make of it - most of this text is verbatim. -TarenCapel 03:31, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Origin of 6 degrees?

The article on Stanley Milgram suggests that his small-world experiment was the source of the "6 degrees of separation" theory. This article suggests that the theory was proposed earlier, in the 20's. Can anyone clarify?

I believe this is flawed. I read about s/1 actually talking about being connected even to eskimos and jungle tribes. hello? It could possibly be the case, that in todays(2006) world, everybody having internet access, has 6DOS to everyone else with internet access. but never ever could you include the people in rural or even remote regions like the amazon or central australia. And in the 20s, that's just bullshit eurocentrism. Any port worker in Boston is connected to any merchant banker in Shanghai(both being port towns) ? In the 20s? Give me a break.-- ExpImptalkcon 21:41, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Excerpt of Karinthy's short story "Láncszemek (Chains)"

It can be found here (in Hungarian): http://members.iif.hu/visontay/ponticulus/rovatok/humor/nexus.html

[edit] Copyright infringement

This page plagiarizes the entry in WhatIs.com, the IT encyclopedia. The entry from WhatIs.com is reproduced here, word for word. Can the user community find a resolution to the issue? I didn't want to delete this entry on Wikipedia outright, but something needs to be done. The WhatIs definition isn't even mentioned here. See the following link for reference: http://searchsmb.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,290660,sid44_gci932596,00.html

The site you mention looks like one of those information dumps that pull stuff from Wikipedia.
Except that it's not. WhatIs.com is one of the most trusted sites for enterprise professionals on the planet. WhatIs.com editors have written every definition within the database. In this case, an editor wrote the definition years before Wikipedia even existed publishing it on October 17, 2003. This issue has been before the Wikipedia community and Wikimedia Foundation for nearly a month now without any action. Please address the lack of attribution or remove the plagiarized material.

[edit] Restart

I have confirmed that the article is taken from WhatIs.com and that the date sequence is such that we need to start over from scratch. There is a lot of scholarship on the subject and I have confidence that the community can get this article back in shape in no time; however, please be mindful of others' intellectual property rights. Sorry for the inconvenience, but that is how it goes sometimes.--BradPatrick 19:24, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Couldn't be bothered to fix it yourself, though, eh? Easier to bitch about (possible) copyright infringement than to actually do something constructive. Typical behavior from the Wiki types: Lots of interest in red tape and voting and silly arbitrations, but not much effort spent actually building an encyclopedia.

[edit] Perplex City

Does anyone know a man named Satoshi pictured at this address: http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=16148

[edit] Lost

Shouldn't there be references to Lost here? It does seem to explore the fact that everyone on the Island is connected.- JustPhil 13:48, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

You are absolutely right, everybody seems to be connected - that is actually the premise of the show. But before you mention that here, remember what your touching points between SDOS and Lost are: "connectedness" and.... mhhmm.. that's it. so, for example you could talk about the royal families of europe, or any other group with much "connectedness", and the relevance to this article would be the same: NONE.-- ExpImptalkcon 21:35, 30 October 2006 (UTC)


What about this lost: www.lost.eu/41994 It is very much based on 6 degrees.

[edit] Wikipedia game

I agree that it doesn't belong in the article, but I put in a link to the page regarding the game on the See Also section. This is because I personally came to the article looking for a reference to the game, so I feel like you need to have a reference to it somewhere. Feel free to share your opinion if you disagree.--CountCrazy007 19:24, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Theoretical Basis?

The theoretical basis seems to make sense but its wording is flawed. It makes the claim that if everyone knew 42 people then 6 billion people could be joined by 6 degrees of separation but it doesn't take into account the idea that person A may know 42 people, one of them beign person B. Person B may know 42 people but for the maths do work correctly person B would have to know 42 people that person A doesn't know. The theoretical basis is mathematically fine but maybe it should be rephrased somehow. I'll do it myself soon if there's no objections. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 211.28.154.175 (talk) 08:03, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

It needs to be stressed that the calculation suggesting that 42 acquaintances per person are required is grossly over-simplified and represents an extreme theoretical minimum. The main problem, as already suggested, is that every person in the network of connections would need to know 42 people unconnected with any of the people at the same of fewer degrees from the starting person, but this is far from a small issue. I can't think of a single one of my friends who is not familiar with at least a few of the others, and I've discovered enough unexpected mutual acquaintances (the last discovery, coincidentally, being only yesterday) to convince me that plenty more remain to be found. The likelihood of duplicated connections should become exponentially higher with every additional degree of separation, resulting in a very much smaller final population.

The last step of the 42^6 calculation suggests that the 131 million people at 5 degrees of separation will know between them some 5.5 billion people each known to none of the others, ie the remaining population of the world!

Clearly the number of people we each need to know is much higher that 42 if we are to reach the global population within 6 degrees, and a considerably more sophisticated formula is needed to even approximate that number. -- Dr Walpurgis 04:22, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Original research in "Theoretical basis" section

As mentioned above, the theoretical basis section is seriously flawed, since it assumes that no one has overlapping groups of acquaintances. More importantly, though, it looks like original research, since it doesn't cite any source. I've added a maintenance tag for now, but I suggest deleting the whole section, since it doesn't really add value to the article; if we just fix it so that the math makes sense, it will still be original research. David 12:53, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

I support all of the above, but would go further - the "theoretical basis" is far from sound and requires at least two unlikely assumptions (each subsequent acquaintance is unique - not a reasonable mathematical model; no geographical implications - an unrealistic view of society). I think the presence of such a "proof" on wikipedia will leave non-experts with great and unfounded confidence in the six degrees principle (and probably leave them counting their friends to see if they can prove it by making more than 42(!)). Added to this, it was added in one edit, by a user account that only ever made that one edit, and there's no evidence that anyone other than that individual supports the model. In light of this, I'm going to take the perhaps controversial step of deleting it before the confusion spreads any further (people treat wikipedia as authoritative these days, not least in proving/disproving urban myths and so on). To wind people up futher, if necessary, I question the claim that the six steps need only be a mean - Karinthy's apparently original formulation seems to state (in that case five) as an upper bound, and made a bet that no-one could find an exception. Well it is wiki after all, if I'm wrong, you can always undo it. Behind The Wall Of Sleep 10:21, 8 October 2007 (UTC)'s largest and most controversial edit to date.
OK I just noticed that the averaging model was introduced by Milgram, so I retract the last bit about mean vs upper bound. I still think the theoretical basis was duff though! Behind The Wall Of Sleep 10:24, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Agree: I agree with the removal. I think that the original edit was well-intentioned, but it detracts from the rest of the article. David 23:51, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Just to add that I also think that the original edit was well intentioned - the author clearly put time and effort into it. My concern with the single-edit nature of it is the lack of review. "Duff" was probably an unnecessarily harsh choice of word on my part. Behind The Wall Of Sleep 16:01, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Balance

I know this is an attractive idea, but it's not universally recognised as scientifically sound, and certainly not mathematically proven. So, in the name of avoiding Wikipedia becoming a device for propagating potential urban myths I have added a couple of detractors' articles in the introduction. I feel this needs to be incorporated near the top of the article, as otherwise it takes a pro-six-degrees PoV. Many of the more ambitious formulations of the six-degrees claim (for example, that six links is a mathematically proven upper bound; that all the letters made it to their targets all around the world; that any human on earth can be reached) seem to be propagating wildly in folklore and wikipedia is first port of call these days to check these things. Good place to put it? Or would a "criticism"/"detractors" type section be better? Behind The Wall Of Sleep 11:25, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

THegeebus says: —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thegeebus (talk • contribs) 02:45, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

I changed this sentence:

Detractors argue that Milgram's experiment did not demonstrate such a link,[1] and the "six degrees" claim has been decried as an "academic urban myth".[2]

to this:

Detractors argue that Milgram's experiment did not demonstrate such a link.[3]


Because the second half of that sentence is misleading.


Whether or not the global community has six degrees of separation is less important than the fact that it is a Small-world network. In other words, it may noy be 6, but it is some relatively small number and that is the key point. By calling it an urban myth, you are calling into question the whole science of scale-free networks. In his book Six Degrees, Duncan J. Watts explains the major flaws with Milgram's experiment. So I have no problem with the first part of your sentence, but to call the whole science an urban myth (which is what it sounds like you are calling it whether or not that is intended) is incorrect.

[edit] Jewish geography

The article Jewish geography necessarily is a rather short article, because once you've described the game, there isn't a whole lot more to say. It would fit here in the popularization section with the Kevin Bacon et al games, and I can't see any reason why it should be an exception to all the games which are incorporated into this article. Thoughts? - Revolving Bugbear 22:43, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Upon a closer look I've noticed that a lot of the popularization sections have daughter articles. However, the point remains that Jewish geography is short and would fit there amongst them; it would hardly be worth doing in summary style, I think. - Revolving Bugbear 23:15, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
Awfully similar to the Kevin Bacon Game. Perhaps best mentioned as a variation of it?--Conrad Kilroy (talk) 03:56, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Iam a sudanese muslim and when was reading the (jewish geugraphy) descirption i realized that we do it all time and it is very common in sudan when you met some one new, you always try to finde a like between you and him, the same way of the (JG) this custom is so common among sudanese in general both muslims and christians. (SUDN)

[edit] "Five Steps to Jesus"

This "section" should be removed. First of all, it has nothing to do with the article. It's not even six degrees, it's five steps. It's irreverent to the article. 24.95.33.170 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 03:06, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Abstract Example"

The abstract example looks like a rewritten version of the "Theoretical Basis" that was previously deleted. It seems to make the same assumptions and, in my opinion, isn't easily understandable. I think it should probably be deleted but I don't trust myself to do that at the moment so I'll leave this comment here. If there are no objections, forever hold your peace.

Dangles1989 (talk) 13:35, 20 May 2008 (UTC)Dangles

Yes, I think the theory has most of the same flaws. The Pnnnnn etc model presented assumes connectedness is absolutely uniform globally; the conclusion about knowing 250 people assumes that these connections are to 250 groups each mutually isolated, and that the same property holds for the onward connections. I realise the contributor has caveated this by describing it as an "abstract example" but I have to say it's so abstract it would be hard to draw a useful conclusion from it. I think it will cause significantly more confusion than it will benefit - as for the erstwhile "theoretical basis" people will go counting their acquaintances and if they reach 250, will consider the six degrees principle "mathematically proven" for the whole world, which it clearly isn't. Also as before, it seems to be original research (and unlikely to be sourced). So I'm going to be bold and delete it! The author is of course invited to revert if we've got it wrong. Behind The Wall Of Sleep (talk) 15:19, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I added the Abstract Example (just a simple construction from graph theory, not Research) because the idea of the average individual connectivity required to give an expected value of six degrees of seperation was not addressed. The assertion that this value is 43 (the sixth root of the population of the Earth) is based on a tree construction and so the expected seperation in this model is very nearly 12 -- that's pretty far from 6. 43 is easily seen to be incorrect. Maybe the previously deleted "Theoretical Basis" addressed this question properly. In my construction each Pnnnnnn represented a single person who knew 250 others single people. It is unrealistic to imagine that every person on the planet is just like every other person with respect to connectivity. But my little example does give the readers a ballpark ideal of what is required for the six-degree conjecture to be true. <wrStark@yahoo.com> —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wrstark (talk • contribs) 05:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)