Problem:
Let , , be nonzero real numbers such that and . Find the value of .
Solution
Solution:
Let , and be the three elementary symmetric polynomials. Since is a symmetric polynomial, it can be written as a polynomial in , and . Now, observe that , and so we only need to worry about the terms not containing . By considering the degrees of the terms, we see that the only possibility is . That is, for some constant . By setting , , we see that .
By similar reasoning, we find that for some constant . By setting and , we get .
So, we now know that implies
Then implies that . Given that , , are nonzero, we get .
Then, .
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