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(Ed.)
In https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.00840, D. Wang and J. Yang in 2016 have posed the problem how to compute the ``third'' discriminant of a polynomial f(X) = (X-A_1) ... (X-A_n), delta_3(f) = product_{1 <= i < j < k < l <= n} ( (A_i + A_j - A_k - A_l) (A_i - A_j + A_k - A_l) (A_i - A_j - A_k + A_l) ), from the coefficients of f; note that delta_3 is a symmetric polynomial in the A_i. For complex roots, delta_3(f) = 0 if the mid-point (average) of 2 roots is equal the mid-point of another 2 roots. Iterated resultant computations yield the square of the third discriminant. We apply a symbolic homotopy by Kaltofen and Trager [JSC, vol. 9, nr. 3, pp. 301--320 (1990)] to compute its squareroot. Our algorithm use polynomially many coefficient field operations.
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