Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-options-ii-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2012/a/a2/c/solution

Induct through the finitely many construction steps. Initially all available coordinates lie in . If coordinates obtained so far lie in a real field , the line through two of its points has coefficients in . A circle with centre in and radius a distance between two such points has equation
whose coefficients lie in , since the squared distance lies in ; the radius itself need not lie there.
Part (b) therefore puts every new intersection in or a real quadratic extension of . If a step produces several points, adjoin their coordinates successively, omitting extensions that add nothing. A finite construction ends in a real field containing the desired coordinates, with a tower of genuine quadratic extensions
The tower law for field extensions yields
A construction involving no nontrivial extension has and degree one.

New to topics? Read the docs here!