Ciro Santilli @cirosantilli  40

The key difference from Lagrangian mechanics is that the Hamiltonian approach groups variables into pairs of coordinates called the phase space coordinates:This leads to having two times more unknown functions than in the Lagrangian. However, it also leads to a system of partial differential equations with only first order derivatives, which is nicer. Notably, it can be more clearly seen in phase space.

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Analogous to what the Euler-Lagrange equation is to Lagrangian mechanics, Hamilton's equations give the equations of motion from a given input Hamiltonian:So once you have the Hamiltonian, you can write down this system of partial differential equations which can then be numerically solved.

Ahh, Ciro Santilli was certain this was some slang neologism, but it is actually Greek! So funny. Introduced into English in the 19th century according to: www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kudo.

One, single. Actual word: μόνος.

It is fun to see that C and G have been confused since antiquity:

Confusingly, in LaTeX:

Lower case looks like the mouth shape when you say Z, with mouth open, and you can even see the little tongue going down. Beauty.

Lowercase looks like a lowercase letter N for some reason.

Why would physicists use a letter such that:Why? Why?????????

This one is a little confusing: the upper case looks exactly like a letter P, but as the name suggests, it actually corresponds to the letter R. The letter P corresponds to pi instead.

Two lower case variants... both used in mathematical notation, and for some reason, in LaTeX \varphi is the one that actually looks like the default standard modern lowercase phi, while \phi is the weird one. I love life.

As if it weren't enough, there's also a Cyrillic script psi that is slightly different. Life's great.

The BBC 1979-1982 adaptations of John Le Carré's novels are the best miniseries ever made:They are the most realistic depiction of spycraft ever made.

Some honorable mentions:

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