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Hamilton's equations


Hamiltonian mechanics is a theory developed as a reformulation of classical mechanics and predicts the same outcomes as non-Hamiltonian classical mechanics. It uses a different mathematical formalism, providing a more abstract understanding of the theory. Historically, it was an important reformulation of classical mechanics, which later contributed to the formulation of statistical mechanics and quantum mechanics.

Hamiltonian mechanics was first formulated by William Rowan Hamilton in 1833, starting from Lagrangian mechanics, a previous reformulation of classical mechanics introduced by Joseph Louis Lagrange in 1788.

In Hamiltonian mechanics, a classical physical system is described by a set of canonical coordinates r = (q, p), where each component of the coordinate qi, pi is indexed to the frame of reference of the system.

The time evolution of the system is uniquely defined by Hamilton's equations:


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