English

From Classical to Quantum Mechanics through Optics

History and Philosophy of Physics 2010-12-21 v1 Physics Education

Abstract

In this paper we revise the main aspects of the Hamiltonian analogy: the fact that optical paths are completely analogous to mechanical trajectories. We follow Schr\"{o}dinger's original idea and go beyond this analogy by changing over from the Hamilton's principal function SS to the wave function Ψ\Psi. We thus travel from classical to quantum mechanics through optics.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0909.3258,
  title  = {From Classical to Quantum Mechanics through Optics},
  author = {Jaume Masoliver and Ana Ros},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0909.3258},
  year   = {2010}
}

Comments

25 pages, 2 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-21T13:47:37.142Z