Nature of The Roots
The discriminant gives additional information on the nature of the roots beyond simply whether there are any repeated roots: it also gives information on whether the roots are real or complex, and rational or irrational. More formally, it gives information on whether the roots are in the field over which the polynomial is defined, or are in an extension field, and hence whether the polynomial factors over the field of coefficients. This is most transparent and easily stated for quadratic and cubic polynomials; for polynomials of degree 4 or higher this is more difficult to state.
Read more about this topic: Discriminant
Famous quotes containing the words nature of, nature and/or roots:
“Consider first the nature of the business in hand; then examine thy own nature, whether thou hast strength to undertake it.”
—Epictetus (c. 50–120)
“Nothing comes to pass in nature, which can be set down to a flaw therein; for nature is always the same and everywhere one and the same in her efficiency and power of action; that is, nature’s laws and ordinances whereby all things come to pass and change from one form to another, are everywhere and always; so that there should be one and the same method of understanding the nature of all things whatsoever, namely, through nature’s universal laws and rules.”
—Baruch (Benedict)
“To the young mind, every thing is individual, stands by itself. By and by, it finds how to join two things, and see in them one nature; then three, then three thousand; and so, tyrannized over by its own unifying instinct, it goes on tying things together, diminishing anomalies, discovering roots running underground, whereby contrary and remote things cohere, and flower out from one stem.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)