Classical Mechanics

The lecturer is Professor Leonard Susskind and the video lectures are courtesy of Stanford University.

The subject of this course is the relationship between symmetry and conservation laws.

Figure 2.3 - Global laws versus local laws

Professor Susskind develops various mathematical formalisms that describe this relationship, including:

• A review of Newton's law, $F = ma$
• The Principle of least action
• The Euler-Lagrange equations
• The Hamiltonian description of phase space, including Liouville's Theorem

We then compare how the various formalisms handle the example of the electromagnetic force law.

We end with a description of Poisson Brackets, an axiomatic approach to classical mechanics.

Disclaimer

This website has no connection or affiliation to either Stanford University or Professor Leonard Susskind.

This is one non-physicist's set of organised notes which, hopefully, may be of some use to others. Any errors in my notes are mine alone and readers should beware that they might not reflect the content of the lectures accurately.

I would very much appreciate all and any corrections, especially on any of the physics or mathematics, but I'm sure there's the odd typo or two!