The way Feynman expresses the flow of amplitude to a certain point given a prior configuration is as a weighted sum over space of sums over path weights. The sum over space is simply weighted by the amplitude distribution of the given configuration and the weight of each path is but itself a sum over time of a quantity called Lagrangian (more precisely the complex exponential of this quantity but whatever) along said path.
Since this quantity is the difference between kinetic and potential energy, it normally should only depends on the position and time derivatives along the path. In that sense the path integral formalism for a finite number of particles is... (read more)
The way Feynman expresses the flow of amplitude to a certain point given a prior configuration is as a weighted sum over space of sums over path weights. The sum over space is simply weighted by the amplitude distribution of the given configuration and the weight of each path is but itself a sum over time of a quantity called Lagrangian (more precisely the complex exponential of this quantity but whatever) along said path.
Since this quantity is the difference between kinetic and potential energy, it normally should only depends on the position and time derivatives along the path. In that sense the path integral formalism for a finite number of particles is... (read more)