A variational method for the classical Liouville equation is introduced that facilitates the development of theories for non-equilibrium classical systems. The method is based on the introduction of a complex-valued auxiliary quantity Ψ that is related to the classical position-momentum...

Smoluchowski and Fokker–Planck equations for the stochastic dynamics of order parameters have been derived previously. The question of the validity of the truncated perturbation series and the initial data for which these equations exist remains unexplored. To address these questions, we take...