A Combinatorial Distinction Between Unit Circles and Straight Lines: How Many Coincidences Can they Have?

Abstract

We give a very general sufficient condition for a one-parameter family of curves not to have n members with ‘too many’ (i.e., a near-quadratic number of) triple points of intersections. As a special case, a combinatorial distinction between straight lines and unit circles will be shown. (Actually, this is more than just a simple application; originally this motivated our results.)