Six Degrees of Separation
Original posting date: June 30, 2009
A freaky thing has been happening to me lately…as my husband says, “it seems like every new person you meet is connected to you”. I end up invariably finding someone in common with random people these days. This has been happening since I moved here to the States five years ago. Back home, I never really cared who was related to whom or who we knew in common. My parents on the other hand found it as a great conversation piece when someone new came over…try to find out relatives and friends in common…and I couldn’t even keep a track of who’s husband’s aunt’s sister-in-law’s daughter they were talking about!!
There’s a theory to explain this phenomenon and it’s called ‘six degrees of separation’. The theory is that everybody in the world is connected to every other person through five other people (at the max.) in common, i.e. six links…Hence the six degrees of separation!
Here’s the Wikipedia page if you want to learn more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_degrees_of_separation.
These connections have been facilitated through increased mobility of people and improvement in telecommunications. I would also attribute some of my success in finding people-in-common to Orkut ( prehistoric social media platform) with their connection feature!
It started as a coincidence and slowly became a habit, but these days I do it compulsively… or more-or-less as an experiment you can say…try and find out if someone new I am meeting has somebody in common with me. It’s becoming really interesting now that recently I found someone in common with an American wife of a friend, whom I haven’t even met yet (barring the friend of course!).
So please don’t mind if it feels like I am prodding too much into your life when I meet you…I am just trying to find our Six Degrees!
Comments
A
Then its Vasudaiva kutumbakam, the whole world is a family..for that matter family n friends :)
The world does seem like a small place then :)
the six degrees of separation are surely there and some people do recognize it some don't; its the state of mind you are in that makes things happen...well say for example a stressed out fellow or graduates students ;) are less likely to recognize these similarity...while a mind more at peace with itself and the surrounding is more likely to do so.
Conclusion: you have reached a stage where you seem to be well at peace with your mind and can truly appreciate your surroundings and not just humans...
Science part: neurons in your brain seem to work much more efficiently and are more receptive when they are not stressed.
A much more enlightened state of mind leads to Psychokinesis. That's why Psychokinesis is really difficult to explain scientifically...its a transient state of mind which doesn't last for too long to prove anything...in simple words...its the happiest moment of the Brain !
I hope the happy state stays for a while :)