Exam question 4 · Kung Fu Panda: real mantises, snakes and monkeys

Ascertain the faculty by which the pit viper detects warm-blooded prey in darkness.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you, pit viper · What happens: ascertain, detect · To what, where: faculty, blooded prey, darkness

This is exam question 4 of lesson 137 «Kung Fu Panda: real mantises, snakes and monkeys» of the biology course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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	Ascertain	ascertain	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 faculty	det
3	faculty	faculty	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Ascertain	obj
4	by	by	ADP	_	5 which	case
5	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	9 detects	obl
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 viper	det
7	pit	pit	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 viper	compound
8	viper	viper	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 detects	nsubj
9	detects	detect	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 faculty	acl:relcl
10	warm	warm	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 blooded	amod
11	-	-	PUNCT	_	10 warm	punct
12	blooded	blooded	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 prey	amod
13	prey	prey	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 detects	obj
14	in	in	ADP	_	15 darkness	case
15	darkness	darkness	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 detects	obl
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Ascertain	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	ascertain	imperative	you not said here	the faculty					vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent faculty=Topic
2	detect	present	the pit viper	blooded prey		darkness		by the faculty	vn see-30.1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer prey=Stimulus

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 · ← Mova's choice

Eyes which emit light of their own

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
2	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	3 emit	nsubj
3	emit	emit	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	1 Eyes	acl:relcl
4	light	light	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 emit	obj
5	of	of	ADP	_	7 own	case
6	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	7 own	nmod:poss
7	own	own	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 light	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	emit	present	Eyes	light of Eyes's own					vn substance_emission-43.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Source light=Theme

Option 2

The sense of taste in its scales

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 sense	det
2	sense	sense	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	of	of	ADP	_	4 taste	case
4	taste	taste	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 sense	nmod
5	in	in	ADP	_	7 scales	case
6	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	7 scales	nmod:poss
7	scales	scale	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 sense	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	sense			taste		taste's scales			nom sense «cognition transitive»: of=patient in=place

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Pits upon the face which are sensitive to heat

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Pits	pit	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 sensitive	nsubj
2	upon	upon	ADP	_	4 face	case
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 face	det
4	face	face	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Pits	nmod
5	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	4 face	nmod
6	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	7 sensitive	cop
7	sensitive	sensitive	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
8	to	to	PART	_	9 heat	mark
9	heat	heat	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 sensitive	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	Pits upon the face Pits upon the face Pits					sensitive property	tree rules
2	heat	to-infinitive	Pits upon the face Pits upon the face Pits not said here						vn cooking-45.3 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient

Option 4

External ears of exceptional sensitivity

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	External	external	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 ears	amod
2	ears	ear	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
3	of	of	ADP	_	5 sensitivity	case
4	exceptional	exceptional	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 sensitivity	amod
5	sensitivity	sensitivity	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 ears	nmod

The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.

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.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/biology/137-kung-fu-panda-real-mantises-snakes-and-monkeys/e4/