Functional Stability Theory I: A Game-Theoretic Framework for the Thermodynamic Stability of Fundamental Parameters

This paper proposes a game-theoretic interpretive framework for the Standard Model of particle physics, grounded in thermodynamic optimization principles. We explore the hypothesis that the observed particle content and coupling constants are consistent with a Nash equilibrium of a multi-scale thermodynamic game, where the payoff function is the integrated entropy production over cosmological timescales. A semi-analytic stellar model demonstrates that the observed fine-structure constant lies within a broad plateau of near-maximal integrated stellar entropy production (S/S_max = 0.988), providing a first quantitative consistency check. Series position FST-I is the particles / thermodynamic stability companion (Level 1) of the FST application series. The programmatic umbrella is the FST Hub (Concept-DOI 10.5281/zenodo.20130499). Sibling application companions: FST-II Chemistry, FST-III Biology, FST-IV Cosmology. Code & sources GitHub: research-line/functional-stability-theory, sub-path applications/fst-i-thermodynamic/. Changelog Version 1.1 (May 2026) Hub-link corrected: "FST-IV Overview" references replaced by "FST Hub" (programmatic umbrella). The Hub paper holds Concept-DOI 10.5281/zenodo.20130499 and is no-numeral; FST-IV is now the cosmological collector slot. GitHub source link added. Related Identifier: FST-DE reference relabelled to "FST-IV Cosmology / FST-DE". Version 1.0 (May 2026) Initial release as part of the FST series. Status: ~8.5/10 readiness per FST series audit; remaining open items for later versions: Polettini 2013 reference on MEPP critique, DE-EN sync, design polish.