Chapter 2. Elements of Classical Mechanics and Electrodynamics

Summary

All phenomena of classical nonrelativistic mechanics are solely based on Newton's laws of motion, which are valid in any inertial frame of reference. The natural symmetry operations of classical mechanics are the Galilean transformations, mediating the transition from one inertial coordinate system to another. The fundamental laws of classical mechanics can equally well be formulated applying the elegant Lagrangian and Hamiltonian descriptions based on Hamilton's action principle. Maxwell's equations for electric and magnetic fields are introduced as the basic laws of classical electrodynamics.