{"id":3914,"date":"2020-11-04T13:51:49","date_gmt":"2020-11-04T13:51:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ambassadors.ucsiuniversity.edu.my\/?p=3914"},"modified":"2020-11-04T13:51:49","modified_gmt":"2020-11-04T13:51:49","slug":"its-a-small-small-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ambassadors.ucsiuniversity.edu.my\/index.php\/2020\/11\/04\/its-a-small-small-world\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s a Small, Small World"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Ever heard of the theory Six Degrees of Separation<\/strong>? It is the idea that everyone in this planet is connected to every other person through a chain of acquaintances of no more than five. So, through at most five other people, you can be connected to any person on Earth, be it the Queen of England, Donald Trump, Jack Ma, or even someone from the Amazon tribe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six Degrees of Separation<\/strong> was first proposed by Frigyes Karinthy<\/em>, a Hungarian author in 1929 in his short story, Chains (L\u00e1ncszemek).<\/em> He believed that the modern world was ‘shrinking’ due to globalization where we become more and more connected, and that despite great physical distances between humans worldwide, the growing density of human networks made the actual social distance far smaller than expected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sounds a little far-fetched? Well, take a look at it this\nway\u2014 assuming that everyone knows at least 44 people, and each of those people\nknow another different 44 people, and so on until the sixth step, we can\ncalculate it with 44^6, which is roughly equals to 7.26 billion people. And I\u2019m\nsure most people know more than 44 people, so the final number turns out to be\nfar greater.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This theory was tested by Stanley Milgram<\/em>, an American sociologist in 1967. Known as the Small-World Experiment<\/strong>, he randomly\nselected people in the Midwest to send packages to a stranger in Massachusetts,\nwith only basic information of the recipient such as name, occupation and\ngeneral location were known. The participants had to send the package to a\nperson they knew on a first-name bases who would most likely know the intended\nrecipient, or know someone who might know the intended recipient. And that\nperson would so the same thing until the package reaches the intended\nrecipient. Although people expected the chain to have over a hundred\nintermediaries, it was shown that it only took around five to seven\nintermediaries for each package to be delivered successfully. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And that was in 1967, more than fifty years ago. With the\ninvention of air planes, cars, bullet trains and many others, we have reduced our\ndistance even more. Many other researchers have done their own testing over the\nyears, with increasingly modern tools such as the internet, and came up with\nsimilar results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, as you can see, everyone can be connected. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And why is this important? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consider the recent outbreak in Wuhan, China. In January to\nFebruary 2020, the outbreak was at its peak in China. Despite the alarming\ninfection rate, death tolls and their brutal lockdown methods, the rest of the world\ndid not take this virus seriously. Flights were still going in and out of\nChina. Many countries did not do effective screening. Donald Trump even tweeted\nthat \u201cIt\u2019s going to be just fine\u201d<\/em>. Many\nthought that the disease was far away, and in their minds, could not touch\nthem. But now, merely 3 months later, the world has been thrown into chaos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In less than half a year, the virus has spread to the four\ncorners of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six Degrees of Separation<\/strong> has been proven once again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, we must understand the consequences of being globally\nconnected. Many of us do not care much beyond our immediate social circle. We\ncare about our family and friends, and our friend\u2019s friends, but anything more\nthan that is just a random person to us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can\u2019t think that way anymore. We must be aware of what is exponential growth, and how every action we take has a ripple effect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As said by Duncan\nWatts<\/em>, a mathematician and network theorist,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPeople may be oblivious to its full impact in their day-to-day lives, but the network is still there. And if the network is only six degrees, you need to pay attention.\u201d <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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