Erdös Number is defined recursively as follows:

• Erdös Has the Number 0
• The Erdös number of a person who has published a paper in collaboration with someone with Erdös Number x is x + 1
• The rest have an Erdös Number infinity

This is what wikipedia has to say about Erdös Number

Erdös numbers have been a part of the folklore of mathematicians throughout the world for many years. Amongst all working mathematicians at the turn of the millennium who have a finite Erdös number, the numbers range up to 15, the median is 5, the average Erdös number is 4.65; and almost everyone with a finite Erdös number has a number less than 8. Due to the very high frequency of interdisciplinary collaboration in science today, very large numbers of non-mathematicians in many other fields of science also have finite Erdös numbers.

More details about Erdös Number can be found at the Erdös Number Project.

You must be wondering why I am writing about this? Well it is just that my Erdös Number is now 4.

why is the title mandatory
>> # The Erdös number of a person who has published a paper in collaboration with someone with Erdös Number x is x + 1

is this definition complete?
Posted by  Deepak on Friday 20th of July 2007 05:20:56 AM

---

doubt....
small, silly, bugging doubt... ur number is 4 - means u worked with someone with #3. doesnt it mean he published a paper in collaboration with you and his number is urs + 1, doesnt it make a cycle? ?? ??? ???? ????? ??????
Posted by  Holla on Wednesday 26th of March 2008 03:27:01 AM

---

Re: doubt....
well, I have just given an informal definition for Erdos number. More formally it is the distance of the shortest path between Erdos and you in the collaboration graph (defined in the link provided in teh article).
Posted by  Harish on Wednesday 26th of March 2008 03:42:06 AM

---

Number of Comments : 3