Six degrees of separation is a popular theory that states every person on the planet is connected through just six individuals. Although the idea has fascinated the world for decades and even inspired a Hollywood movie, how much of it is based on actual science?

In Veritasium’s most recent YouTube video, The Science of Six Degrees of Separation, host Derek Muller further investigated the concept of six degrees of separation. According to Muller, although the idea of six degrees of separation has been around since the 1930s, it was not scientifically tested until the 1960s, when Harvard sociologist Stanley Milgram set up his “Small World” study. For the study, Milgrim sent packages to 300 individuals living in either Boston or Nebraska and asked them to use their networks to get the packages back to one specific stockbroker in Boston. Although 64 of the packages reached the target with an average of 5.2 connections, there were many flaws in Milgrim’s experiment, such as the fact that many of the individuals involved in the study lived in the same city and had the same profession as the target.

Although Milgrim’s experiment may have been flawed, scientists have been able to see just how accurate the idea of six degrees of separation really is using models of real-life social networks. In today’s world of social media, it’s even easier to maintain connections with distant acquaintances than ever before. For example, Muller explained that in 2011 Facebook analyzed their data and found that 92 percent of all their users were connected through just five steps.

To truly put the idea of six degrees of separation to the test, Muller invites the nearly 440,000 individuals who viewed his video to try and reach him by email. If you’re feeling up to the challenge, follow the directions in the video’s description.