For the early modern period, Six Degrees of Francis Bacon changes all of that.
Friday, October 16, 2015
Six Degrees of Francis Bacon Launches
For the early modern period, Six Degrees of Francis Bacon changes all of that.
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9 comments:
Okay, this is just sick. I've always wondered the relationships between my favorite figures in history, but there's so much work and research that goes into finding if two cool people met in a bar, had a conversation, and exchanged a few letters with each other. There's a book that I've been reading called Possession: A Romance by a woman named A.S. Byatt. In it, two fictional scholars of separate fictional poets discover that there might have been somewhat of a romance between them, though up until the love letters were discovered they were thought in the canon to have been monogamous. A connection between two prolific artists, writers, politicians, etc. makes all the difference in our future understandings of their motivations and ideals. Since we can't meet them face to face and have a conversation about their lives and beliefs, their written histories are all we have. The fact that Georgetown and CMU have created Six Degrees of Francis Bacon makes it much easier for history nerds to get their connections on.
This is an amazing resource and asset to scholars in any discipline. When talking about the past, I think it's easy for us to picture great composers, artists, and authors as solitary beings whose work came from them alone. This program, however, helps us to paint a clearer picture of who they were as people as well as trace their influences and who they might have influenced themselves. I'm also glad to read that they focused a lot of time and energy on the aesthetic appeal of the program, because that's such an important factor in catching and keeping a user's attention regardless of how amazing the information being presented is. I think this will become an important and much-used tool in the years to come, especially for historians and creators but also just for anyone interested in the great thinkers and doers of the past. I would be interested to hear more about the research that went into creating this program, since it seems like such a massive undertaking.
This project is amazing. I always have loved to see historical things that happened at the same time like Martin Luther King Jr. being born int he same year as Anne Frank, and they always got be wondering about all the other connections that had happened in history that seem like they are in entirely different realms, but really happened very close to one another. I’m always shocked and excited when I’m researching someone for school and realize that they knew another famous person whom I thought they never could have met. The amount of work that has already gone into this project is amazing and it’s really great that the creators are opening it up to the public to add connections as they find them. Hopefully it doesn't become as untrustworthy as people think wikipedia is, and they can maintain the source as much as possible. I can’t wait to see how far this goes, it’s already on it’s way to becoming history itself.
‘Six Degrees of Francis Bacon’ is not only a very interesting historical project, but also an amazing example for how educational tools should be constructed and used. I’ve always hated that academia has this inaccessible bubble around it, and that certain resources are limited to those of a certain level of education. I fully believe that educational resources should be not only available publicly, but also structured in a way to encourage people who are exploring something new. The fact that this project has put so much thought into making it student-friendly says a lot about the kind of project it is. It also allows for both experts and students to contribute their knowledge, and can create a friendly dialogue across disciplines and skill levels. These things are vital to creating a safe educational environment. I think one of the biggest reasons people find themselves stuck in a discipline is that there aren’t enough resources to allow themselves to branch out, and this project is an example of how that status quo can be turned around.
Is this the new and technology driven and historical version of six degrees to Kevin Bacon? Its pretty amazing to see how we are all connected, as a teenager I know my friends and I used to try to connect ourselves to Kevin Bacon. I love history and am so happy that I can connect historical figures to each other. If I had time, and didn’t have to finish all these comments, I would play on this for hours. This is an incredible project and I am thrilled that it was accomplished and made public for all to see. It may even engage people otherwise unlikely to give any thought to history or important historical figures. I’d have no interest in searching myself to modern celebrities, but the idea of finding out how many degrees historical figures are from each other is awesome. Though, I’d like to know how many degrees I am from Anne Boleyn.
This is six degrees of separation taken to a whole new level, and it is amazing. I cannot believe the amount of thought that went into every level of the program. It is so cool to think how interconnected historical figures are. With the invention of the Internet, we know how interconnected today’s celebrities politicians, and artists are, but I would not think about the fact that historical figures have the same level of interrelations. It puts the past into a perspective that you would never get from a book or in a lecture hall because it shows how the figure is a product of not only where they grew up and where they lived, but also whom they knew and who they associated with. People oftentimes impact each other more than time and place and this project helps present that.
I do think it is interesting that women typically have less points of reference because there is less known about their history. I would have not thought about it from that frame of mind if I had not read the article before looking at the application.
I think that this is a great idea and I'm really looking forward to trying it out. I also think it's pretty hilarious that is has the name that it does, and I've had a pretty good time playing six degrees of Kevin Bacon. I think the work between two very high level universities to create something that is so complicated is really admirable, and I also think that the system could be used as recreational use. You could probably sit for hours and just talk about how Einstein was related to so and so through other people and I think that that is really cool. In a time where technology helps us connect now it is important that we use it to connect what we couldn't before. I am really excited to use this, and get to see who's connected to who!
Six degrees of Francis Bacon. It seems like a pretty good spin off of six degrees of Kevin Bacon, where you can see how the different actors are in relation to Kevin Bacon. This seems like a pretty cool website for those who enjoy literature and history, and how those different playwrights and authors are connected in one way or another. By being able to make those connections, I agree that it’s a great way to be able to educate students to understand the backgrounds of these people that we have come to read and enjoy so often. When we assume only one or two connections, and it is actually multiple connections. It shouldn’t come as a surprise for us. Just how we are so connected to others around the world. Authors of old I’m sure were just as familiar with others’ works, because that who they grew up reading.
This project is really amazing for us history nerds. Living in an age where you can trace your relationship with someone through your Facebook timeline, or see how many mutual friends you have with people you don't know, it is interesting to think about all the connections, chance meetings, and unknown friendships that are hidden away in past ages. Six Degrees of Francis Bacon is helping uncover those, and see those social networks the way we can so easily see our own. You can't really understand a person and their work until you understand the social environment they are coming from and the other people that influence them. This program is helping us to understand the real people and relationships behind the great events and works of history. The people that make history have always been much more interesting to me than the actual events, and this website is giving us a bit more understanding into their world. Thank you CMU and Georgetown for giving me a new favorite way to procrastinate.
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