Test 6 · Timon and Pumbaa: real meerkats and warthogs

What would happen if a meerkat mob had no lookout while feeding?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: meerkat mob · What happens: happen, have, feed · To what, where: lookout

This is test 6 of lesson 125 «Timon and Pumbaa: real meerkats and warthogs» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 happen	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	aux
3	happen	happen	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	if	if	SCONJ	_	8 had	mark
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	7 mob	det
6	meerkat	meerkat	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 mob	compound
7	mob	mob	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 had	nsubj
8	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	advcl
9	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	10 lookout	det
10	lookout	lookout	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 had	obj
11	while	while	SCONJ	_	12 feeding	mark
12	feeding	feed	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	8 had	advcl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	happen	would			vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	have a condition, not said to happen	past	a meerkat mob	no lookout	vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent lookout=Patient
3	feed	gerund	a meerkat mob not said here		vn gorge-39.6 «NP V PP.patient»: agent=Agent

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1

They would find more food safely

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 find	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 find	aux
3	find	find	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	more	more	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	5 food	amod
5	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 find	obj
6	safely	safely	ADV	_	3 find	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	find	would	They	more food				safely property	vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent food=Topic

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

Nothing, meerkats are too fast to be hunted by anything

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	root	root
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	6 fast	punct
3	meerkats	meerkat	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 fast	nsubj
4	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	6 fast	cop
5	too	too	ADV	_	6 fast	advmod
6	fast	fast	ADJ	Degree=Pos	1 Nothing	amod
7	to	to	PART	_	9 hunted	mark
8	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	9 hunted	aux:pass
9	hunted	hunt	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	6 fast	advcl
10	by	by	ADP	_	11 anything	case
11	anything	anything	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Ind	9 hunted	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	meerkats					fast property	tree rules
2	hunt	to-infinitive · passive	meerkats not said here					by anything	vn hunt-35.1 «NP V PP.theme PP.location»: by anything=Location

Option 3

They would all fall asleep

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 fall	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 fall	aux
3	all	all	ADV	_	4 fall	advmod
4	fall	fall	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	asleep	asleep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 fall	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	fall	would	They					all, asleep property	vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

Hawks could catch them before they noticed

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Hawks	hawk	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 catch	nsubj
2	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 catch	aux
3	catch	catch	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 catch	obj
5	before	before	SCONJ	_	7 noticed	mark
6	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 noticed	nsubj
7	noticed	notice	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 catch	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	catch	could	Hawks	them = they					vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme
2	notice	past	Hawks = hawk						vn see-30.1-1 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Experiencer

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

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