> "Instead of showing we live in a small world, it really shows the > opposite," she said. "Ninety-eight percent of people can't reach > anybody. What do they conclude? `Hey, we're all connected.' What? All > I'm saying is his study didn't prove it."
I have always considered Milgram a brilliant researcher. What if we are all really connected, but pretend otherwise, seeking to shut out unwanted attention ? Welcome to alienation in the information age... I only believe it when I see it in lived experience, and even then I have to remove my doubts. This relates to an interesting connection between market institutions and communication processes - market institutions require promise-keeping (contractual fulfillment) and trust to operate effectively, but what, scientifically speaking, is the basis of trust, if anything can mean anything in a communication, if indeed the negotiation of meaning is negotiable ? A probabilistic inference from observable behaviour ? Actual behaviour in real time ? Or the imposition of meaning ? "The proof of the pudding is in the eating." - Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote de la Mancha. "Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof" - Galbraith's Law "Facts per se can neither prove nor refute anything. Everything is decided by the interpretation and explanation of the facts, by the ideas and the theories" - Ludwig von Mises Jurriaan
