Group Info Name: Six Degrees of Separation Type: Common Interest - Friends Description: **Do NOT join this group unless you have read rules and meet the requirements** To invite friends, click the "invite people to join" tab to the right of the screen and check the boxes next to your friends names. Make sure they are actually your friends. The small world phenomenon (also known as the small world effect) is the hypothesis that everyone in the world can be reached through a short chain of social acquaintances. The concept gave rise to the famous phrase six degrees of separation after a 1967 small world experiment by social psychologist Stanley Milgram which suggested that two random US citizens were connected on average by a chain of six acquaintances. That is, a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend knows the president of the United States, or the Queen of the Netherlands, or the president of France or Osama and so on However, after more than forty years its status as a description of heterogeneous social networks (such as the aforementioned "everyone in the world") still remains an open question. Little research has been done in this area since the publication of the original paper. VERY IMPORTANT: You cannot request to join this group! Please do not request to join this group...you can ONLY join by being invited and accepting the invitation. If this theory is to be confirmed, you will eventually be invited by one of your friends. If you have a friend who has joined this group, then you may join. Facebook doesn't let me block everyone from joining while enabling those who join to invite friends therefore this group must be open. So, PLEASE DO NOT join unless you are friends with any of the members of this group. Members, please do not forget to invite some of you friends. THIS IS HOW THIS WORKS: It is somewhat unclear if it is possible to demonstrate the theory of six degrees of separation" using a facebook group because we cannot differentiate the tangible degrees" However, the small world effect/ phenomenon can still be demonstrated. If I invite all of my friends to join and they invite theirs to join and so on, then through such acquaintances, it seems that we will be able to reach the whole world (world in this case being the facebook community ONLY THROUGH FRIENDS) (also, this is different than groups like "the largest facebook group ever" because such groups do not show that everyone in the group are a friend of a friend of a friend...etc). However, this group demonstrates that we are all a friend of a friend (...and so on) and that we are acquainted with one another through friends possibly by means of the Six Degrees of Separation" theory. Meaning that eventually everyone in this group has a connection through a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend to me. I encourage those who are interested to contemplate the idea of the Six Degrees of Separation" on the discussion boards and whether you find it plausible or not. It seems that while this group cannot prove or disprove the theory of the Six Degrees of Separation", it may however demonstrate that the whole world can possibly be reached through a short chain of acquaintances. It will be interesting to see how this works out. Feel free to use the wall to tell of personal experiences and interesting connections. ===========

So I thought it'd be fun to have a thought of the day section, so here it is... Thought of the Day: Ever wonder why gossip spreads so fast? Watch what you say, guard your tongue from Lashon Hara. My thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of those affected by the massacre at Virginia Tech. Dr. Liviu Lebrescu is a holocaust survivor and hero who risked his life to save the lives of his students. Read his story here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2305652350 Contact Info Email: RyanDosetareh@gmail.com Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_world_phenomenon Recent News Try connecting yourself with others on the Discussion boards, it's fun. When this group reaches 300,000 I will randomly select 6 people (these people being the 6 that show up under the members section of this page) and I will try to link those six subjects to me to test out the theory. The average of the Degrees of Separation should not be more than 6. OK, here it is: RYAN DOSETAREH 1. Adam Klien 2. Jeremy Adler 3. Josh Twersky 4. Rachel Saks LAUREL CONDON RYAN DOSETAREH 1.Brandon White 2. Christina Carmen Chiknas 3. Sarah Steiner 4. Jennifer Forsthoefel 5. Pippa Simmons 6. Jake Armstrong CAELEIGH BROHM RYAN DOSETAREH 1.Ben Perlow 2.Lauren Bowles 3.Brett Clark's 4.Kendrick Brinson 5.Annie Agnone 6.Katie Mercer AMANDA FORTIER RYAN DOSETAREH 1. Aaron Wersing 2. Michelle Ahoobim 3. Jordan Gimelstein 4. Faye Elizabeth Maiman CAITLIN PRINCE RYAN DOSETAREH 1. Darren Tobin 2. Robin Goodman 3. Lauren Kuncewitch

4. Matt Cardona 5. Eric King BRIAN LOMASKY RYAN DOSETAREH 1. Jonathan Freinkel 2. David Blane 3. Ashley Gross' RYAN MCGETTIGAN Average Degree of Separation: 4.67 I will redo this once the group reaches 400,000.

MATHEMATICAL PERSPECTIVE: This is a post I saw earlier by a member of the group. I am not sure that it shows anything more than the possibility of reaching the worlds population through 6 rounds... Post #37 Nick McIntosh (Kettering) wrote on Feb 1, 2007 at 5:21 PM Yeah, the 'Mathmatical Proof' is nonsense. What is the real math behind the six degrees thing, then? How about this: The sixth root of the CIA's July 2006 world population estimate of 6,525,170,264 is 43.228. So lets be humanitarian and round up to 44. 44^6 = 7,256,313,856 I am certain beyond any doubt that I know more than 44 people that don't know each other. That may not be true for everyone, but as long as the world average (of the number of people one knows, that don't know each other) is above 43.228, statistical reasoning suggests that the theory holds true. ----------------------------------------------------------------------