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Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age
 
 
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Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age [Paperback]

Duncan Watts (Author)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
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Frequently Bought Together

Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age + Sync: The Emerging Science of Spontaneous Order (Penguin Press Science) + Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities and Software
Price For All Three: £21.47

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Product details

  • Paperback: 368 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage; New edition edition (6 May 2004)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0099444968
  • ISBN-13: 978-0099444961
  • Product Dimensions: 13.1 x 2.5 x 19.9 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 102,623 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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More About the Author

Duncan J. Watts
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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

You may be only six degrees away from Kevin Bacon, but would he lend you his car? It depends on the network that links you. In Six Degrees, sociologist Duncan Watts examines networks like these: what they are, how they're being studied, and what we can use them for. When the power goes out, when we find that a stranger knows someone we know, when dot-com stocks soar in price, networks are evident. To illustrate the often complicated mathematics that describe such structures, Watts uses plenty of examples from real life, without which this book would quickly move beyond a general science readership. Small chapters make each thought-provoking conclusion easy to swallow, though some are hard to digest. For instance, in a short bit on "coercive externalities", Watts sums up sociological research showing that:
Conversations concerning politics displayed a consistent pattern ... On election day, the strongest predictor of electoral success was not which party an individual privately supported but which party he or she expected would win."
Six Degrees attempts to help readers understand the new and exciting field of networks and complexity. While considerably more demanding than a general book such as The Tipping Point, it offers readers a snapshot of a riveting moment in science, when understanding things such as disease epidemics and the stock market seems almost within our reach. --Therese Littleton, Amazon.com --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Independent on Sunday

The insights here are fairly mind-blowing
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful
By Pieter HALL OF FAME TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
The author calls the science of networks a science of real people, where stuff like friendships, rumours, diseases, fashion and music trends, commerce and finance are all involved. He explains how this science fits into the larger scheme of scientific progress and what it tells us about the world in our connected age.

The book really covers two narratives: The history and development of the science of networks itself, plus the manifestation of network phenomena in the real world.
Chapters 2 to 5 investigate real world networks, chapters 3 to 5 consider the creation and implication of various models of networked systems, whilst chapters six (Epidemics and Failures), seven (Decisions, Delusions and the Madness of Crowds), eight (Thresholds, Cascades and Predictability) and nine (Innovation, Adaptation and Recovery) explore the spread of diseases, recovery, fads, politics, finance and organizational strength.

Some of the lessons of this thought-provoking book are that distance is deceptive and that in connected systems, cause and effect are related in complicated and sometimes misleading ways. In the latter regard, Watts discusses the many initial rejections that Kerouac's later very popular classic On The Road had to endure and the similar case of Rowling's first Harry Potter book.

The Further Reading section is arranged by chapter and provides recommendations of websites and books on that particular topic. The text contains tables, figures and some black and white illustrations and the book concludes with a bibliography and index. The Hidden Connections by Fritjof Capra and Small World by Mark Buchanan are similar books that I have found to be interesting and informative in this regard

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book explains the theoretical maths behind theories like Tipping Point. As a non-mathematician I found it heavy going, but I felt like I was learning something and it does show that the more populist books about the spread of ideas and the importance of networks might have a theoretical as well as observational underpinning.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
By Pieter HALL OF FAME TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
The author calls the science of networks a science of real people, where stuff like friendships, rumours, diseases, fashion and music trends, commerce and finance are all involved. He explains how this science fits into the larger scheme of scientific progress and what it tells us about the world in our connected age. The book really covers two narratives: The history and development of the science of networks itself, plus the manifestation of network phenomena in the real world.

Chapters 2 to 5 investigate real world networks, chapters 3 to 5 consider the creation and implication of various models of networked systems, whilst chapters six (Epidemics and Failures), seven (Decisions, Delusions and the Madness of Crowds), eight (Thresholds, Cascades and Predictability) and nine (Innovation, Adaptation and Recovery) explore the spread of diseases, recovery, fads, politics, finance and organizational strength.

Some of the lessons of this thought-provoking book are that distance is deceptive and that in connected systems, cause and effect are related in complicated and sometimes misleading ways. In the latter regard, Watts discusses the many initial rejections that Kerouac's later very popular classic On The Road had to endure and the similar case of Rowling's first Harry Potter book.

The Further Reading section is arranged by chapter and provides recommendations of websites and books on that particular topic. The text contains tables, figures and some black and white illustrations and the book concludes with a bibliography and index. The Hidden Connections by Fritjof Capra and Small World by Mark Buchanan are similar books that I have found to be interesting and informative in this regard.

Comment | 
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