Typically, the phase space contains duplicates of the same physical state in multiple distinct locations. This is a consequence of the way that a physical state is encoded into mathematical coordinates; the simplest choice of coordinate system often allows a state to be encoded in multiple ways. An example of this is a gas of identical particles whose state is written in terms of the particles' individual positions and momenta: when two particles are exchanged, the resulting point in phase space is different, and yet it corresponds to an identical physical state of the system. It is important in statistical mechanics (a theory about physical states) to recognize that the phase space is just a mathematical construction, and to not naively overcount actual physical states when integrating over phase space. Overcounting can cause serious problems: