Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age (Open Market Edition)

"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."

From epidemics of disease to outbreaks of market madness, from people searching for information to firms surviving crisis and change, from the structure of personal relationships to the technological and social choices of entire societies, Watts weaves together a network of discoveries across an array of disciplines to tell the story of an explosive new field of knowledge, the people who are building it, and his own peculiar path in forging this new science. 24 b/w illustrations.

If you're looking for an easy piece of entertainment, this is not the book for you. Watts shows how this field has advanced by combining research efforts in information science, physics, mathematics and sociology. We look over his shoulder as he collaborates with other scientists to solve tough problems -- and get a glimpse of modern science in action (although I think Watts emphasizes the more positive, cooperative aspects of "doing science").

Students of psychology will enjoy his discussion of Milgram's famous experiment -- messages mailed to a Boston stockbroker -- and the real, as compared to legendary, results. Milgram's even more outrageous obedience experiment, which Watts includes, also deserves a footnote: subjects refused to obey (a) when the experimenter broke the rules and gave reasons for the order and (b) when they were able to reconstruct their roles outside the laboratory.

I began by borrowing this book from a library but realized that it needs to be owned. It's not a quick, one-time read. Although it's accessible, you have to pay attention and I found a need to read sequentially, from chapter to chapter. But if you read carefully, you'll change the way you look at the world.

As other reviewers have noted, Watts shows how daily life is influenced by properties of networks: Why do some viruses, computer and biological, spread, and why others come to a quick halt? Why do airline hub-and-spoke networks often break down? How do computer searches work and what makes them effective?

We're living in an increasingly connected world and this book will help us see and understand the connections more clearly. I think it's a must for anyone who wants to comprehend our world today.


Watts turns complex ideas into clear concepts. This is Tipping Point on steroids.   October 6, 2005
D. Stuart (Auckland NZ)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful

If you've read Gladwell's excellent Tipping Point your appetite will possibly be whetted by the idea of connectivity and how ideas, trends, problems or diseases might spread. Network Science is a fascinating zone because our world has suddenly become a lot more connected - think even right here how Amazon has linked people like you and me, right here, right now.

Duncan Watts is one of the leading scientists in this zone, and in this generous text he traces how the science has grown and begun to glue together the sciences of mathematics, physics and sociology in order to explain how phenomena move and spread through our worlds.

Watts is a consummate writer, so he knows how to choose a good metaphor and use a great case study to illustrate his points, many of which begin in Gladwell territory and then climb to a much higher conceptual level - without requiring the reader to don an oxygen mask.

Among the really fascinating ideas is how quickly a society of seemingly disparate networks can suddenly galvanise into a single web where even 6 degrees of separation may seem like an unnecessarily long distance. Lurking underneath this idea is the suggestion that our world - now it has internet - is shrinking at an unimaginable rate. If you tune in to Watts' arguments (and he's one of the main scientists who have been proving these ideas) then the global village suddenly looks extremely dynamic and capable of spreading dreadful pandemics as well as powerful abilities to create and spread solutions.

I mention that Watts is very generous in his writing style. The book is told first person, yet he is modest about his own role, gives credit where it is due and then delivers us an annotated reading list graded by complexity of writing. The bibliography demonstrates his own wide world of inspirations, and gives us the launch pad to reach even higher, if we wish. I loved Tipping Point, but this book has more muscle.


Omnipresent networks explained   July 24, 2004
Pieter (Johannesburg)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful

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: A Science for Sustainable Living by Fritjof Capra and Nexus: Small Worlds and the Groundbreaking Theory of Networks by Mark Buchanan are similar books that I have found to be interesting and informative in this regard.



An entertaining and illuminating read!   March 19, 2003
35 out of 36 found this review helpful

Contrary to some recent remarks from an apparently aggrieved reader, I think Six Degrees is actually quite different from most books claiming to cover new and exciting scientific developments. Far from being self-aggrandizing, I found it's tone remarkably humble and generous to others. Watts, in fact, is the first person to call his subject the "new" science of networks, and goes to considerable lengths to acknowledge, even glorify, his intellectual predecessors. He doesn't mention every scientist who has made contributions: it's not meant to be a text book, thankfully.

Watts also has bigger fish to fry than simply the importance of networks in everything under the sun. His real message is that social reality has to be understood both in terms of the way people are connected and also the way they behave. So focusing on individual behavior to the exclusion of their interactions misses half the story, but so does just focusing on the interactions (as much of network theory has done). It's true that many of the ideas are quite old (and Watts again is the first to point this out), but the way they are put together is new, and that is what is so interesting about it.

The results are often quite deep and thought provoking, which means you have to actually read the book to understand what's in it, but Watts always comes up with an entertaining anecdote or analogy to make even the hardest concepts palatable and interesting. Overall, it's a great, fun read about a fascinating subject that really makes you think. And what more can you ask from a book?


One of the best written books of the year   April 11, 2004
Arnold V. Loveridge (Sacramento, CA USA)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

This was one of the most fascinating books I've read recently. Although I had heard of the concept of at most six links between any two people on the earth and the connection with Kevin Bacon as well as a famous mathematician whose name I forget right now, I was not aware of the origin of this concept. Watts tells a fascinating tale of statisticians, social workers, mathematicians, physicists, network engineers, and several other disciplines whose work derives from or adds to the whole science of networks and connectedness. The networking and connectedness of people studying connectedness is as fascinating as any topic in the book. It almost makes me want to go back to college and choose some aspect of network theory as a thesis. Exciting book.