A Purely Algebraic Proof of the Fundamental Theorem of Algebra

Abstract

Proofs of the fundamental theorem of algebra can be divided up into three groups according to the techniques involved: proofs that rely on real or complex analysis, algebraic proofs, and topological proofs. Algebraic proofs make use of the fact that odd-degree real polynomials have real roots. This assumption, however, requires analytic methods, namely, the intermediate value theorem for real continuous functions. In this paper, we develop the idea of algebraic proof further towards a purely algebraic proof of the intermediate value theorem for real polynomials. In our proof, we neither use the notion of continuous function nor refer to any theorem of real and complex analysis. Instead, we apply techniques of modern algebra: we extend the field of real numbers to the non-Archimedean field of hyperreals via an ultraproduct construction and explore some relationships between the subring of limited hyperreals, its maximal ideal of infinitesimals, and real numbers.