Paul Erdos Has A Kevin-Bacon Number!

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Leroy Quet

Posted: Tue Dec 16, 2003 9:47 pm

Guest

On lighter side...

By the way, interestingly,..

Paul Erdos Has A Kevin-Bacon Number...

and, of course, vice-versa (but in the filmic, not mathematical,
sense).

Any guesses as to what the shared number is?

Solution here:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/cgi-bin/oracle/movielinks?firstname=Paul+Erdos&secondname=Kevin+Bacon&using=1&game=0

;)

(The website in the link gets its info from another website's very
comprehensive database. Perhaps someone mixed up 2 people with the
same
name, but not that likely.)

By the way, related to movies/math, and from that database-website
mentioned in previous sentence:

http://www.imdb.com/List?tv=on&&keywords=mathematics&&heading=19;mathematics

(Link: a list of movies{etc} in the database with "mathematics" as a
keyword.
{"mathematics" is loosely defined here.})

thanks,
Leroy
Quet

Stephen J. Herschkorn

Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 5:16 am

Guest

Leroy Quet wrote:

Quote:

Kevin Bacon has a Paul Erdos number of...

But that doesn't seem quite right to me: The link is by co-appearance
in films, not by a co-authorships. Leroy phrased it correctly: Erdos
has a Bacon number.

Who knew Erdos ever appeared in film?...

--
Stephen J. Herschkorn herschko@rutcor.rutgers.edu

Mensanator

Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:44 pm

Guest

Quote:

Subject: Re: Paul Erdos Has A Kevin-Bacon Number!
From: "Stephen J. Herschkorn" herschko@rutcor.rutgers.edu
Date: 12/17/2003 4:16 AM Central Standard Time
Message-id: <O1WDb.236026$655.42966432@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net

Leroy Quet wrote:

On lighter side...

By the way, interestingly,..

Paul Erdos Has A Kevin-Bacon Number...

and, of course, vice-versa (but in the filmic, not mathematical,
sense).

Any guesses as to what the shared number is?

Solution here:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/cgi-bin/oracle/movielinks?firstname=Paul+Erdo
s&secondname=Kevin+Bacon&using=1&game=0

;)

The site says

Kevin Bacon has a Paul Erdos number of...

But that doesn't seem quite right to me: The link is by co-appearance
in films, not by a co-authorships.

That's why it's called a "Paul Erdos number" and not an "Erdos number".
Any actor can be the reference point for these link calculations. Depending
on how you reference the question, you get either

Kevin Bacon has a Paul Erdos number of 4

or

Paul Erdos has a Kevin Bacon number of 4

which are the same number, but if you look at the aggregate stats, it makes
a difference who the reference is. See "The Center of the Hollywood Universe"
on the Oracle of Bacon home page. Kevin Bacon is closer to the center of
the Hollywood universe than Paul Erdos is.

Since the last time I checked, the center has shifted from Christopher Lee to
an actor who died in 2002. Even though he is dead, he moves closer to the
center
as the people he is linked to appear in new movies.

Quote:

Leroy phrased it correctly: Erdos
has a Bacon number.

Who knew Erdos ever appeared in film?...

--
Stephen J. Herschkorn herschko@rutcor.rutgers.edu

--
Mensanator
Ace of Clubs

Edwin Clark

Posted: Sat Dec 20, 2003 7:25 pm

Guest

Quote:

Paul Erdos Has A Kevin-Bacon Number...

The most complete information on Erdös Numbers and such that I know of is
Jerry Grossman's website: The Erdös Number Project which may be found at:

http://personalwebs.oakland.edu/~grossman/erdoshp.html

Grossman's link: "Related Concepts" at

http://personalwebs.oakland.edu/~grossman/related.html

tells of the Erdös link to Kevin Bacon via films.

---Edwin Clark

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