Groups of motions and mechanics I: point mechanics

Abstract

It is shown that physical mechanics for pointlike bodies can be effectively modeled in terms of the action of transformation groups that act as symmetries of the solutions of systems of differential equations that describe the integrability of dynamical states. The equations of motion are then obtained from these integrability equations for the dynamical states. It is also observed that the functions that define the components of a dynamical state represent a set of mechanical constitutive laws. The variational formulation of mechanics is shown to be a specialization of these principles.