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Some paradoxical aspects of the Nos\'e and Nos\'e-Hoover dynamics of 1984 and Dettmann's dynamics of 1996 are elucidated. Phase-space descriptions of thermostated harmonic oscillator dynamics can be simultaneously expanding, incompressible, or contracting, as is described here by a variety of three- and four-dimensional phase-space models. These findings illustrate some surprising consequences when Liouville's continuity equation is applied to Hamiltonian flows., Comment: Eight pages with three figures

Typical Hamiltonian liquids display exponential "Lyapunov instability", also called "sensitive dependence on initial conditions". Although Hamilton's equations are thoroughly time-reversible, the forward and backward Lyapunov instabilities can differ, qualitatively. In numerical work, the expected forward/backward pairing of Lyapunov exponents is also occasionally violated. To illustrate, we consider many-body inelastic collisions in two space dimensions. Two mirror-image colliding crystallites can either bounce, or not, giving rise to a single liquid drop, or to several smaller droplets, depending upon the initial kinetic energy and the interparticle forces. The difference between the forward and backward evolutionary instabilities of these problems can be correlated with dissipation and with the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Accordingly, these asymmetric stabilities of Hamilton's equations can provide an "Arrow of Time". We illustrate these facts for two small crystallites colliding so as to make a warm liquid. We use a specially-symmetrized form of Levesque and Verlet's bit-reversible Leapfrog integrator. We analyze trajectories over millions of collisions with several equally-spaced time reversals., Comment: 13 pages and 11 figures, prepared for Douglas Henderson's 80th Birthday Symposium at Brigham Young University in August 2014 revised to incorporate referee's suggestions as an acknowledgment