Energy Density of a Dissipative Polarizable Solid by a Lagrangean Formalism

A Lagrangean for the dynamics of an electromagnetic field in a dispersive and dissipative material is constructed (adapting some ideas by Bekenstein and Hannay) and an expression for the energy density that is positive is obtained from it. The expression contains extra (sink) degrees of freedom that represent dissipating modes. In simplified cases the sink modes can be eliminated to yield an energy density expression in terms of the electromagnetic fields, the polarization and the magnetization only, but which contains parameters associated with the sink modes. The method of adding extra modes can be used to set up a Lagrangean formalism for dissipative systems in general, such that will reinstate time-translation invariance and will yield a unique energy density.