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An engaging and informative introduction. -- "Science Playfully and clearly written... [Watts] uses examples adroitly, and mixes abstract theory with real-world anecdotes with superb skill... I have not enjoyed reading a book this much in a long time. -- Peter Kareiva, Quarterly Review of Biology [Small Worlds] will be seized on by those seeking a first rough map of this fascinating new mathematical land. Those entering can expect to find some amazing connections between areas of research with apparently nothing in common, such as neurology to business studies. But then, it's a small world. -- Robert Matthews, New Scientist Informally written and aimed at a wide audience, this book shows how mathematics yields new vistas on ubiquitous and seemingly familiar aspects of our world. -- "Choice
Review
An engaging and informative introduction. -- Science
Playfully and clearly written. . . . [Watts] uses examples adroitly, and mixes abstract theory with real-world anecdotes with superb skill. . . . I have not enjoyed reading a book this much in a long time. -- Peter Kareiva, Quarterly Review of Biology
[Small Worlds] will be seized on by those seeking a first rough map of this fascinating new mathematical land. Those entering can expect to find some amazing connections between areas of research with apparently nothing in common, such as neurology to business studies. But then, it's a small world. -- Robert Matthews, New Scientist
Informally written and aimed at a wide audience, this book shows how mathematics yields new vistas on ubiquitous and seemingly familiar aspects of our world. -- Choice
Playfully and clearly written. . . . [Watts] uses examples adroitly, and mixes abstract theory with real-world anecdotes with superb skill. . . . I have not enjoyed reading a book this much in a long time. -- Peter Kareiva, Quarterly Review of Biology
[Small Worlds] will be seized on by those seeking a first rough map of this fascinating new mathematical land. Those entering can expect to find some amazing connections between areas of research with apparently nothing in common, such as neurology to business studies. But then, it's a small world. -- Robert Matthews, New Scientist
Informally written and aimed at a wide audience, this book shows how mathematics yields new vistas on ubiquitous and seemingly familiar aspects of our world. -- Choice
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The Kevin Bacon Game is a curious thing to be sure. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
The Kevin Bacon Game is a curious thing to be sure. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
27 of 28 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Watts' innovative study of the small world phenomena has helped to revitalise this field of research, which had until recently been considered trivial in academic circles, material for anecdotes, rather than an important feature of network organisation. Watts shows how and why networks can be organised along small world principles, with examples as diverse as the spread of diseases (or gossip) through a population, the connectivity of worm's neural structures, and, infamously, the Kevin Bacon Game. While the book starts at a gentle pace, the mathematical detail soon becomes fairly dense, especially for those with little post-school mathematical training. However, the reader's perseverance is rewarded by Watts, who has provided a range of applications of small world theory, making this a must for anyone planning to study network organisation.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
7 reviews
82 of 90 people found the following review helpful
Not as wide ranging as the reviews led me to believe
14 Mar 2000
Format:Hardcover
I read the review in New Scientist, and liked the sound of this book. When it arrived I read the blurb on the back, and was further encouraged by the fact that a Sociology Professor was encouraging students to read it. I was therefore expecting a reasonably tough but rewarding read (my math is at undergraduate level and somewhat dated, but I do make an effort). Instead with the exception of a few pieces of commentary, particularly at the beginning, I found the book virtually impenetrable because of the denseness of the mathematical modelling techniques used. I suspect this is one strictly for the experts, and those with excellent post-graduate math skills.
19 of 22 people found the following review helpful
Not enough contents to be a good book
7 July 2005
Format:Hardcover
Networks are since a couple of years object of intense research in several different disciplines. One reason therefore is certainly the outstanding article by Watts and Strogatz, Collective dynamics of small world networks, Nature, 393:440--442, 1998. Unfortunatelly, this book can not continue the high level of this article. Actually, it does not really provide much more information than the article itself. I would suggest to read the article cited above and either decide for another book or to look directly in the literature and read the origninal articles.
To summarize, this book is not terribly weak, but one can clearly sees that it swims on the current 'complex networks' wave without providing enough justification for its existence. Of course, if you do not have access to the original literature and just what to have a general overview of complex networks and what be done with them, you may consider buying this book.
To summarize, this book is not terribly weak, but one can clearly sees that it swims on the current 'complex networks' wave without providing enough justification for its existence. Of course, if you do not have access to the original literature and just what to have a general overview of complex networks and what be done with them, you may consider buying this book.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Hard
11 Aug 2008
Format:Paperback
This book is very hard for non-numerate individuals (like myself, a law student). I picked it up after reading Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age (Open Market Edition), hoping I would find longer - but equally accessible - explanations of those concepts that are sketched in the latter.
Unfortunately, I didn't. The book is essentially a presentation of the modelling techniques used by Prof. Watts in arriving to the theory of Small Worlds. A thorouhg understanding would require truly firm foundations in statistics, graph theory and topology. Without that, you'll probably be able to understand at most twenty pages (out of 241).
If you have read Six Degrees, you'll still find some useful and still accessible discussion on multidimensional scaling, i.e. on the problem of measuring social distance, which Watts later discusses in Six Degrees with reference to the problem of search in networks. However, that's just about it.
My two-star rating is by no means meant to criticise Prof. Watts's ideas, or the substantial contentions he makes in the book (very few of which I was able to understand from a mathematical point of view, due to my faulty background). Deserving two starts, instead, are the Editorial reviews, which are hugely misleading. This is not "aimed at a wide audience". Or, better, it is aimed at a wide audience of MATHEMATICIANS. It is a technical one, and that would need to be made explicit.
Unfortunately, I didn't. The book is essentially a presentation of the modelling techniques used by Prof. Watts in arriving to the theory of Small Worlds. A thorouhg understanding would require truly firm foundations in statistics, graph theory and topology. Without that, you'll probably be able to understand at most twenty pages (out of 241).
If you have read Six Degrees, you'll still find some useful and still accessible discussion on multidimensional scaling, i.e. on the problem of measuring social distance, which Watts later discusses in Six Degrees with reference to the problem of search in networks. However, that's just about it.
My two-star rating is by no means meant to criticise Prof. Watts's ideas, or the substantial contentions he makes in the book (very few of which I was able to understand from a mathematical point of view, due to my faulty background). Deserving two starts, instead, are the Editorial reviews, which are hugely misleading. This is not "aimed at a wide audience". Or, better, it is aimed at a wide audience of MATHEMATICIANS. It is a technical one, and that would need to be made explicit.
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