Round 11: Tossup 18

For an algebraic number field K, a quantity of this name determines which primes ramify K and equals the determinant of a trace pairing matrix. For a polynomial, this noun denotes the product of all squared differences between pairs of roots. This noun appears in the name of a supervised learning method that finds weighted sums of features that maximize the ratio of between (-5[1])and within-class variances; that linear method was developed by Fisher. A complicated quantity of this name that includes the term “27 a-squared (10[1])d-squared” (10[1])appears in the innermost (-5[1])square root in Cardano’s formula. (-5[1])The sign of a quantity of this name determines the number (-5[1])of roots of a quadratic polynomial. (10[1])For 10 points, what noun denotes the quantity “b-squared (10[1])minus 4 a (-5[1])c” in the quadratic formula? (10[1])■END■ (10[1]0[2])

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