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Thomas Tunstall

Publications and source records attributed to Thomas Tunstall.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

When will androids outnumber humans?

Humanoid robots are increasingly discussed not only as machines but also as a potential technological population. We develop a nonlinear population-dynamical framework to examine their possible diffusion relative to humans, without assuming that large-scale adoption or numerical crossover is inevitable. The human population $H(t)$ is calibrated to the United Nations World Population Prospects 2024 median trajectory. The android population $A(t)$ is represented through the normalized stock $a=A/A_s$. A conventional, human-organized manufacturing and adoption channel is calibrated to a conditional scenario spanning approximately $10^4$ humanoids in 2025 to $10^9$ in 2050 and follows $\dot a=(q_M+r_Ma)\exp(K_Ma^γ)$. We separately introduce a hypothetical autonomous channel in which installed androids contribute materially to producing additional androids. Under the minimal canonical TZ closure, the corresponding production--feedback number is $\mathcal{P}(a)=(r_A/δ_A)\exp(K_Ra)$, where $r_A$ is the gross robot-mediated production coefficient, $δ_A$ the retirement rate, and $K_R$ the autonomous feedback parameter. This channel is locally self-amplifying if and only if $\mathcal{P}>1$, whereas numerical human--android parity, $A=H$, is a separate cumulative condition. Global uncertainty analysis shows that crossover dates remain strongly scenario-dependent, while the production--feedback threshold is more robust. An extreme early-autonomy stress test can produce parity by 2050, but this represents a conditional dynamical boundary rather than a technological forecast.

physics.soc-ph↗

How Social Network Structure Impacts the Ability of Zealots to Promote Weak Opinions

Social networks are often permeated by agents who promote their opinions without allowing for their own mind to be changed: Understanding how these so-called `zealots' act to increase the prevalence of their promoted opinion over the network is important for understanding opinion dynamics. In this work, we consider these promoted opinions to be `weak' and therefore less likely to be accepted relative to the default opinion in the network. We show how the proportion of zealots in the network, the relative strength of the weak opinion, and the structure of the network impact the long-term proportion of the those in the network who subscribe to the weak opinion.

physics.soc-ph↗

Assisted percolation of slow-spreading mutants in heterogeneous environments

Environmental heterogeneity can drive genetic heterogeneity in expanding populations; mutant strains may emerge that trade overall growth rate for an improved ability to survive in patches that are hostile to the wild type. This evolutionary dynamic is of practical importance when seeking to prevent the emergence of damaging traits. We show that a sub-critical slow-spreading mutant can attain dominance even when the density of patches is below their percolation threshold and predict this transition using geometrical arguments. This work demonstrates a phenomenon of ''assisted percolation'', where one sub-critical process assists another to achieve super-criticality.

q-bio.PE↗