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Could anyone please help a lowly 2nd year undergrad understand what the hamiltonian function of action means!
[tex]W = \int_{t_0}^t \mathcal{L}\,dt[/tex]
Apparently Schrodinger used it along with the Hamilton-Jacobi equation to derive the Schrodinger equation so it's a pretty important part of quantum physics history.
According to wikipedia it's a function which takes the trajectory of a system and returns a real number. But this seems quite vague to me, what is the significance of the scalar it outputs?
I've also looked in several books, but the mathematics of analytical mechanics is mind-boggling, I don't really have the time right now to fully digest the whole of the subject. The only definitions I've gotten from various book seem to be very vague and mathematical.
Thanks :)
[tex]W = \int_{t_0}^t \mathcal{L}\,dt[/tex]
Apparently Schrodinger used it along with the Hamilton-Jacobi equation to derive the Schrodinger equation so it's a pretty important part of quantum physics history.
According to wikipedia it's a function which takes the trajectory of a system and returns a real number. But this seems quite vague to me, what is the significance of the scalar it outputs?
I've also looked in several books, but the mathematics of analytical mechanics is mind-boggling, I don't really have the time right now to fully digest the whole of the subject. The only definitions I've gotten from various book seem to be very vague and mathematical.
Thanks :)