Equivalent to Lagrangian mechanics but formulated in a different way.
Motivation: Lagrangian vs Hamiltonian.
TODO understand original historical motivation, www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZXHoWwBcDc says it is from optics.
Intuitively, the Hamiltonian is the total energy of the system in terms of arbitrary parameters, a bit like Lagrangian mechanics.
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