Abel–Ruffini theorem

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Not to be confused with Abel's theorem.
In mathematics, the Abel–Ruffini theorem (also known as Abel's impossibility
theorem) states that there is no solution in radicals to general polynomial
equations of degree five or higher with arbitrary coefficients. Here, general means that
the coefficients of the equation are viewed and manipulated as indeterminates.
The theorem is named after Paolo Ruffini, who made an incomplete proof in 1799,
[1]
 (which was refined and completed in 1813[2] and accepted by Cauchy) and Niels
Henrik Abel, who provided a proof in 1824.[3][4]
Abel–Ruffini theorem refers also to the slightly stronger result that there are equations
of degree five and higher that cannot be solved by radicals. This does not follow from
Abel's statement of the theorem, but is a corollary of his proof, as his proof is based on
the fact that some polynomials in the coefficients of the equation are not the zero
polynomial. This improved statement follows directly from Galois theory § A non-
solvable quintic example. Galois theory implies also that
is the simplest equation that cannot be solved in radicals, and
that almost all polynomials of degree five or higher cannot be
solved in radicals.
The impossibility of solving in degree five or higher contrasts
with the case of lower degree: one has the quadratic formula,
the cubic formula, and the quartic formula for degrees two,
three, and four, respectively.

Contents

 1Context
 2Proof
o 2.1Algebraic solutions and field theory
o 2.2Galois correspondence
o 2.3Solvable symmetric groups
o 2.4Polynomials with symmetric Galois groups
 2.4.1General equation
 2.4.2Explicit example
 3Cayley's resolvent
 4History
 5References

Context[edit]
Polynomial equations of degree two can be solved with
the quadratic formula, which has been known since antiquity.
Similarly the cubic formula for degree three, and the quartic
formula for degree four, were found during the 16th century.
At that time a fundamental problem was whether equations of
higher degree could be solved in a similar way.
The fact that every polynomial equation of positive degree
has solutions, possibly non-real, was asserted during the 17th
century, but completely proved only at the beginning of the
19th century. This is the fundamental theorem of algebra,
which does not provide any tool for computing exactly the
solutions, although Newton's method allows approximating
the solutions to any desired accuracy.
From the 16th century to beginning of the 19th century, the
main problem of algebra was to search for a formula for the
solutions of polynomial equations of degree five and higher,
hence the name the "fundamental theorem of algebra". This
meant a solution in radicals, that is, an expression involving
only the coefficients of the equation, and the operations
of addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and nth root
extraction.
The Abel–Ruffini theorem proves that this is impossible.
However, this impossibility does not imply that a specific
equation of any degree cannot be solved in radicals. On the
contrary, there are equations of any degree that can be
solved in radicals. This is the case of the equation  for any n,
and the equations defined by cyclotomic polynomials, all of
whose solutions can be expressed in radicals.
Abel's proof of the theorem does not explicitly contain the
assertion that there are specific equations that cannot be
solved by radicals. Such an assertion is not a consequence of
Abel's statement of the theorem, as the statement does not
exclude the possibility that "every particular quintic
equation might be soluble, with a special formula for each
equation."[5] However, the existence of specific equations that
cannot be solved in radicals seems to be a consequence of
Abel's proof, as the proof uses the fact that some polynomials
in the coefficients are not the zero polynomial, and, given a
finite number of polynomials, there are values of the variables
at which none of the polynomials takes the value zero.
Soon after Abel's publication of its proof, Évariste
Galois introduced a theory, now called Galois theory that
allows deciding, for any given equation, whether it is solvable
in radicals (this is theoretical, as, in practice, this decision
may need huge computation which can be difficult, even with
powerful computers). This decision is done by introducing
auxiliary polynomials, called resolvents, whose coefficients
depend polynomially upon those of the original polynomial.
The polynomial is solvable in radicals if and only if some
resolvent has a rational root.

Proof[edit]
The proof of the Abel–Ruffini theorem predates Galois theory.
However, Galois theory allows a better understanding of the
subject, and modern proofs are generally based on it, while
the original proofs of the Abel–Ruffini theorem are still
presented for historical purposes.[1][6][7][8]
The proofs based on Galois theory comprise four main steps:
the characterization of solvable equations in terms of field
theory; the use of the Galois correspondence between
subfields of a given field and the subgroups of its Galois
group for expressing this characterization in terms of solvable
groups; the proof that the symmetric group is not solvable if
its order is five or higher; and the existence of polynomials
with a symmetric Galois group.
Algebraic solutions and field theory[edit]
An algebraic solution of a polynomial equation is
an expression involving the four basic arithmetic
operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division),
and root extractions. Such an expression may be viewed as
the description of a computation that starts from the
coefficients of the equation to be solved and proceeds by
computing some numbers, one after the other.
At each step of the computation, one may consider the
smallest field that contains all numbers that have been
computed so far. This field is changed only for the steps
involving the computation of an nth root.
So, an algebraic solution produces a sequence
of fields, and elements  such that  for  with  for some
integer  An algebraic solution of the initial polynomial
equation exists if and only if there exists such a sequence
of fields such that  contains a solution.
For having normal extensions, which are fundamental for
the theory, one must refine the sequence of fields as
follows. If  does not contain all -th roots of unity, one
introduces the field  that extends  by a primitive root of
unity, and one redefines  as 
So, if one starts from a solution in terms of radicals, one
gets an increasing sequence of fields such that the last
one contains the solution, and each is a normal extension
of the preceding one with a Galois group that is cyclic.
Conversely, if one has such a sequence of fields, the
equation is solvable in terms of radicals. For proving this,
it suffices to prove that a normal extension with a cyclic
Galois group can be built from a succession of radical
extensions.
Galois correspondence[edit]
The Galois correspondence establishes a one to one
correspondence between the subextensions of a normal
field extension  and the subgroups of the Galois group of
the extension. This correspondence maps a
field K such  to the Galois group  of
the automorphisms of F that leave K fixed, and,
conversely, maps a subgroup H of  to the field of the
elements of F that are fixed by H.
The preceding section shows that an equation is solvable
in terms of radicals if and only if the Galois group of
its splitting field (the smallest field that contains all the
roots) is solvable, that is, it contains a sequence of
subgroups such that each is normal in the preceding one,
with a quotient group that is cyclic. (Solvable groups are
commonly defined with abelian instead of cyclic quotient
groups, but the fundamental theorem of finite abelian
groups shows that the two definitions are equivalent).
So, for proving Abel–Ruffini theorem, it remains to prove
that the symmetric group  is not solvable, and that there
are polynomials with symmetric Galois group.
Solvable symmetric groups[edit]
For n > 4, the symmetric group  of degree n has only
the alternating group  as a nontrivial normal
subgroup (see Symmetric group § Normal subgroups).
For n > 4, the alternating group  is
not abelian and simple (that is, it does not have any
nontrivial normal subgroup). This implies that
both  and  are not solvable for n > 4. Thus, the Abel–
Ruffini theorem results from the existence of polynomials
with a symmetric Galois group; this will be shown in the
next section.
On the other hand, for n ≤ 4, the symmetric group and all
its subgroups are solvable. Somehow, this explains the
existence of the quadratic, cubic, and quartic formulas.
Polynomials with symmetric Galois
groups[edit]
General equation[edit]
The general or generic polynomial equation of degree n is
the equation
where  are distinct indeterminates. This is an equation
defined over the field  of the rational
fractions in  with rational number coefficients. The
original Abel–Ruffini theorem asserts that, for n > 4,
this equation is not solvable in radicals. In view of the
preceding sections, this results from the fact that
the Galois group over F of the equation is
the symmetric group  (this Galois group is the group of
the field automorphisms of the splitting field of the
equation that fix the elements of F, where the spliiting
field is the smallest field containing all the roots of the
equation).
For proving that the Galois group is  it is simpler to
start from the roots. Let  be new indeterminates,
aimed to be the roots, and consider the polynomial
Let  be the field of the rational fractions in  and  be
its subfield generated by the coefficients
of  The permutations of the  induce automorphisms
of H. Vieta's formulas imply that every element
of K is a symmetric function of the  and is thus
fixed by all these automorphisms. It follows that
the Galois group  is the symmetric group 
The fundamental theorem of symmetric
polynomials implies that the  are algebraic
independent, and thus that the map that sends
each  to the corresponding  is a field isomorphism
from F to K. This means that one may consider  as
a generic equation. This finishes the proof that the
Galois group of a general equation is the
symmetric group, and thus proves the original
Abel–Ruffini theorem, which asserts that the
general polynomial equation of degree n cannot be
solved in radicals for n > 4.
Explicit example[edit]
See also: Galois theory §  A non-solvable quintic
example
The equation  is not solvable in radicals, as will be
explained below.
Let q be . Let G be its Galois group, which acts
faithfully on the set of complex roots of q.
Numbering the roots lets one identify G with a
subgroup of the symmetric group . Since  factors
as  in , the group G contains a permutation g that
is a product of disjoint cycles of lengths 2 and 3 (in
general, when a monic integer polynomial reduces
modulo a prime to a product of distinct monic
irreducible polynomials, the degrees of the factors
give the lengths of the disjoint cycles in some
permutation belonging to the Galois group);
then G also contains , which is a transposition.
Since  is irreducible in , the same principle shows
that G contains a 5-cycle. Because 5 is prime, any
transposition and 5-cycle in  generate the whole
group; see Symmetric group § Generators and
relations. Thus . Since the group  is not solvable,
the equation  is not solvable in radicals.

Cayley's resolvent[edit]
Testing whether a specific quintic is solvable in
radicals can be done by using Cayley's resolvent.
This is a univariate polynomial of degree six whose
coefficients are polynomials in the coefficients of a
generic quintic. A specific irreducible quintic is
solvable in radicals if and only, when its
coefficients are substituted in Cayley's resolvent,
the resulting sextic polynomial has a rational root.

History[edit]
Around 1770, Joseph Louis Lagrange began the
groundwork that unified the many different tricks
that had been used up to that point to solve
equations, relating them to the theory of groups
of permutations, in the form of Lagrange
resolvents.[9] This innovative work by Lagrange was
a precursor to Galois theory, and its failure to
develop solutions for equations of fifth and higher
degrees hinted that such solutions might be
impossible, but it did not provide conclusive proof.
The first person who conjectured that the problem
of solving quintics by radicals might be impossible
to solve was Carl Friedrich Gauss, who wrote in
1798 in section 359 of his book Disquisitiones
Arithmeticae (which would be published only in
1801) that "there is little doubt that this problem
does not so much defy modern methods of
analysis as that it proposes the impossible". The
next year, in his thesis, he wrote "After the labors
of many geometers left little hope of ever arriving
at the resolution of the general equation
algebraically, it appears more and more likely that
this resolution is impossible and contradictory."
And he added "Perhaps it will not be so difficult to
prove, with all rigor, the impossibility for the fifth
degree. I shall set forth my investigations of this at
greater length in another place." Actually, Gauss
published nothing else on this subject. [1]

Paolo Ruffini, Teoria generale delle equazioni, 1799

The theorem was first nearly proved by Paolo

Ruffini in 1799.[10] He sent his proof to several
mathematicians to get it acknowledged, amongst
them Lagrange (who did not reply) and Augustin-
Louis Cauchy, who sent him a letter saying: "Your
memoir on the general solution of equations is a
work which I have always believed should be kept
in mind by mathematicians and which, in my
opinion, proves conclusively the algebraic
unsolvability of general equations of higher than
fourth degree."[11] However, in general, Ruffini's
proof was not considered convincing. Abel wrote:
"The first and, if I am not mistaken, the only one
who, before me, has sought to prove the
impossibility of the algebraic solution of general
equations is the mathematician Ruffini. But his
memoir is so complicated that it is very difficult to
determine the validity of his argument. It seems to
me that his argument is not completely
satisfying."[11][12]
The proof also, as it was discovered later, was
incomplete. Ruffini assumed that all radicals that
he was dealing with could be expressed from the
roots of the polynomial using field operations
alone; in modern terms, he assumed that the
radicals belonged to the splitting field of the
polynomial. To see why this is really an extra
assumption, consider, for instance, the
polynomial . According to Cardano's formula, one
of its roots (all of them, actually) can be expressed
as the sum of a cube root of  with a cube root of .
On the other hand, since , , , and , the roots , ,
and  of  are all real and therefore the field  is a
subfield of . But then the numbers  cannot belong
to . While Cauchy either did not notice Ruffini's
assumption or felt that it was a minor one, most
historians believe that the proof was not complete
until Abel proved the theorem on natural
irrationalities, which asserts that the assumption
holds in the case of general polynomials. [7][13] > The
Abel–Ruffini theorem is thus generally credited to
Abel, who published a proof compressed into just
six pages in 1824.[3] (Abel adopted a very terse
style to save paper and money: the proof was
printed at his own expense.[8]) A more elaborated
version of the proof would be published in 1826. [4]
Proving that the general quintic (and higher)
equations were unsolvable by radicals did not
completely settle the matter, because the Abel–
Ruffini theorem does not provide necessary and
sufficient conditions for saying precisely which
quintic (and higher) equations are unsolvable by
radicals. Abel was working on a complete
characterization when he died in 1829.[14]
According to Nathan Jacobson, "The proofs of
Ruffini and of Abel [...] were soon superseded by
the crowning achievement of this line of research:
Galois' discoveries in the theory of equations." [15] In
1830, Galois (at the age of 18) submitted to
the Paris Academy of Sciences a memoir on his
theory of solvability by radicals, which was
ultimately rejected in 1831 as being too sketchy
and for giving a condition in terms of the roots of
the equation instead of its coefficients. Galois was
aware of the contributions of Ruffini and Abel,
since he wrote "It is a common truth, today, that
the general equation of degree greater
than 4 cannot be solved by radicals... this truth has
become common (by hearsay) despite the fact that
geometers have ignored the proofs of Abel and
Ruffini..."[1] Galois then died in 1832 and his
paper Mémoire sur les conditions de resolubilité
des équations par radicaux[16] remained
unpublished until 1846, when it was published
by Joseph Liouville accompanied by some of his
own explanations.[14] Prior to this publication,
Liouville announced Galois' result to the academy
in a speech he gave on 4 July 1843.[5] A
simplification of Abel's proof was published
by Pierre Wantzel in 1845.[17] When Wantzel
published it, he was already aware of the
contributions by Galois and he mentions that,
whereas Abel's proof is valid only for general
polynomials, Galois' approach can be used to
provide a concrete polynomial of degree 5 whose
roots cannot be expressed in radicals from its
coefficients.
In 1963, Vladimir Arnold discovered a topological
proof of the Abel–Ruffini theorem,[18][19][20] which
served as a starting point for topological Galois
theory.[21]

References[edit]
1. ^ Jump up to:a b c d Ayoub, Raymond G. (1980), "Paolo
Ruffini's Contributions to the Quintic", Archive for
History of Exact Sciences, 22 (3): 253–
 277,  doi:10.1007/BF00357046, JSTOR 41133596,  M
R 0606270, S2CID  123447349, Zbl  0471.01008
2. ^ Ruffini, Paolo (1813). Riflessioni intorno alla
soluzione delle equazioni algebraiche generali
opuscolo del cav. dott. Paolo Ruffini ...  (in Italian).
presso la Societa Tipografica.
3. ^ Jump up to:a b Abel, Niels Henrik  (1881)
[1824], "Mémoire sur les équations algébriques, ou
l'on démontre l'impossibilité de la résolution de
l'équation générale du cinquième degré"  (PDF),
in  Sylow, Ludwig;  Lie, Sophus (eds.), Œuvres
Complètes de Niels Henrik Abel  (in French), vol. I
(2nd  ed.), Grøndahl & Søn, pp. 28–33
4. ^ Jump up to:a b Abel, Niels Henrik  (1881)
[1826], "Démonstration de l'impossibilité de la
résolution algébrique des équations générales qui
passent le quatrième degré"  (PDF), in Sylow,
Ludwig; Lie, Sophus  (eds.),  Œuvres Complètes de
Niels Henrik Abel (in French), vol.  I
(2nd  ed.), Grøndahl & Søn, pp. 66–87
5. ^ Jump up to:a b Stewart, Ian  (2015), "Historical
Introduction", Galois Theory (4th  ed.), CRC
Press, ISBN 978-1-4822-4582-0
6. ^ Rosen, Michael I.  (1995), "Niels Hendrik Abel and
Equations of the Fifth Degree",  American
Mathematical Monthly, 102 (6): 495–
505,  doi:10.2307/2974763,  JSTOR  2974763,  MR 133
6636,  Zbl 0836.01015
7. ^ Jump up to:a b Tignol, Jean-Pierre (2016), "Ruffini and
Abel on General Equations", Galois' Theory of
Algebraic Equations  (2nd ed.),  World
Scientific, ISBN 978-981-4704-69-4,  Zbl 1333.12001
8. ^ Jump up to:a b Pesic, Peter (2004), Abel's Proof: An
Essay on the Sources and Meaning of Mathematical
Unsolvability, Cambridge:  MIT Press,  ISBN  0-262-
66182-9,  Zbl 1166.01010
9. ^ Lagrange, Joseph-Louis (1869) [1771], "Réflexions
sur la résolution algébrique des équations", in Serret,
Joseph-Alfred  (ed.), Œuvres de Lagrange, vol.  III,
Gauthier-Villars, pp. 205–421
10. ^ Ruffini, Paolo  (1799), Teoria generale delle
equazioni, in cui si dimostra impossibile la soluzione
algebraica delle equazioni generali di grado superiore
al quarto  (in Italian), Stamperia di S. Tommaso
d'Aquino
11. ^ Jump up to:a b Kiernan, B. Melvin (1971), "The
Development of Galois Theory from Lagrange to
Artin", Archive for History of Exact Sciences,  8 (1/2):
40–154, doi:10.1007/BF00327219,  JSTOR  41133337, 
S2CID  121442989
12. ^ Abel, Niels Henrik  (1881) [1828],  "Sur la resolution
algébrique des équations"  (PDF), in  Sylow,
Ludwig; Lie, Sophus  (eds.),  Œuvres Complètes de
Niels Henrik Abel (in French), vol.  II
(2nd  ed.), Grøndahl & Søn, pp. 217–243
13. ^ Stewart, Ian  (2015), "The Idea Behind Galois
Theory",  Galois Theory  (4th ed.),  CRC
Press, ISBN 978-1-4822-4582-0
 14. ^ Jump up to:a b Tignol, Jean-Pierre (2016),
"Galois",  Galois' Theory of Algebraic
Equations (2nd  ed.), World Scientific,  ISBN  978-981-
4704-69-4, Zbl  1333.12001
15. ^ Jacobson, Nathan  (2009), "Galois Theory of
Equations", Basic Algebra, vol.  1 (2nd  ed.),
Dover,  ISBN  978-0-486-47189-1
16. ^ Galois, Évariste (1846),  "Mémoire sur les conditions
de resolubilité des équations par
radicaux"  (PDF),  Journal de Mathématiques Pures et
Appliquées  (in French), XI: 417–433
17. ^ Wantzel, Pierre (1845),  "Démonstration de
l'impossibilité de résoudre toutes les équations
algébriques avec des radicaux", Nouvelles Annales de
Mathématiques (in French),  4: 57–65
18. ^ Alekseev, V. B. (2004), Abel's Theorem in Problems
and Solutions: Based on the Lectures of Professor V. I.
Arnold, Kluwer Academic Publishers, ISBN 1-4020-
2186-0, Zbl  1065.12001
19. ^ "Short Proof of Abel's Theorem that 5th Degree
Polynomial Equations Cannot be Solved" on YouTube
20. ^ Goldmakher, Leo, Arnold's Elementary Proof of the
Insolvability of the Quintic  (PDF)
21. ^ Khovanskii, Askold (2014),  Topological Galois
Theory: Solvability and Unsolvability of Equations in
Finite Terms, Springer Monographs in
Mathematics,  Springer-Verlag, doi:10.1007/978-3-642-
38871-2,  ISBN  978-3-642-38870-5

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 Galois theory
 Niels Henrik Abel
 Solvable groups
 Theorems about polynomials
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