Two ‘types’ of residents are randomly distributed across the grid. Each wants at least a certain proportion of their neighbors to be ‘like them’. Those who are dissatisfied move to a random empty cell. Repeat and watch what happens.
Thomas Schelling showed in 1971 that even a very soft preference — 'want at least one third of my neighbors to be like me' — without any intention of avoiding anyone, self-organizes into starkly divided quarters. Nobody wanted segregation, but it still emerged.
Try setting tolerance at 30–35% — seems like a very soft requirement, and see how starkly it still divides up in the end.
⏸ Pause
↺ Shuffle
Empty→A→B
Go
0
Dissatisfied
0%
Segregation index (average proportion of similar neighbors)
0%
Click any cell to manually toggle it: empty → A resident → B resident → back to empty.