Test 9 · The Amazon forest floor: leafcutters, army ants, tapirs, j…

«why don't the trees just grow deep roots like at home» What is the best answer?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 2 · right ✓ · Who acts: trees · What happens: not grow, be · To what, where: deep roots, best answer · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 9 of lesson 157 «The Amazon forest floor: leafcutters, army ants, tapirs, jaguars and the giant spider» 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	«	«	PUNCT	_	8 grow	punct
2	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	8 grow	advmod
3	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	8 grow	aux
4	n't	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	8 grow	advmod
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 trees	det
6	trees	tree	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 grow	nsubj
7	just	just	ADV	_	8 grow	advmod
8	grow	grow	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	19 answer	advcl
9	deep	deep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	10 roots	amod
10	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 grow	obj
11	like	like	ADP	_	13 home	case
12	at	at	ADP	_	13 home	case
13	home	home	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 roots	nmod
14	»	»	PUNCT	_	8 grow	punct
15	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	19 answer	nsubj
16	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	19 answer	cop
17	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	19 answer	det
18	best	good	ADJ	Degree=Sup	19 answer	amod
19	answer	answer	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
20	?	?	PUNCT	_	19 answer	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not grow in a quote	present · do-support	the trees	deep roots				like home	vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location root=Theme
2	be speech: assert	present		the best answer					tree rules

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

Deep roots would get eaten by jaguars

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Deep	deep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 roots	amod
2	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 eaten	nsubj:pass
3	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 eaten	aux
4	get	get	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	5 eaten	aux:pass
5	eaten	eat	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
6	by	by	ADP	_	7 jaguars	case
7	jaguars	jaguar	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 eaten	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	eat	would · passive	jaguars	Deep roots					vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=Patient

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

The rich layer of soil is thin, so roots spread wide and buttresses hold the tree up

The tree, 17 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 layer	det
2	rich	rich	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 layer	amod
3	layer	layer	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 thin	nsubj
4	of	of	ADP	_	5 soil	case
5	soil	soil	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 layer	nmod
6	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	7 thin	cop
7	thin	thin	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 spread	punct
9	so	so	ADV	_	11 spread	advmod
10	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 spread	nsubj
11	spread	spread	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	7 thin	parataxis
12	wide	wide	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 spread	xcomp
13	and	and	CCONJ	_	15 hold	cc
14	buttresses	buttress	NOUN	Number=Plur	15 hold	nsubj
15	hold	hold	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	11 spread	conj
16	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	17 tree	det
17	tree	tree	NOUN	Number=Sing	15 hold	obj
18	up	up	ADP	_	15 hold	compound:prt

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	is	present	the rich layer of soil		thin property	tree rules
2	spread	present	roots		wide property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
3	hold up	present	buttresses	the tree		vn support-15.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot tree=Theme

Option 3

The trees are too short to need deep roots, so they never grow them and just lean on each other

The tree, 20 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 trees	det
2	trees	tree	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 short	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 short	cop
4	too	too	ADV	_	5 short	advmod
5	short	short	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
6	to	to	PART	_	7 need	mark
7	need	need	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 short	advcl
8	deep	deep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 roots	amod
9	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 need	obj
10	,	,	PUNCT	_	14 grow	punct
11	so	so	ADV	_	14 grow	advmod
12	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	14 grow	nsubj
13	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	14 grow	advmod
14	grow	grow	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 short	parataxis
15	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	14 grow	obj
16	and	and	CCONJ	_	18 lean	cc
17	just	just	ADV	_	18 lean	advmod
18	lean	lean	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	14 grow	conj
19	on	on	ADP	_	20 each	case
20	each	each	DET	ExtPos=PRON PronType=Rcp	18 lean	obl
21	other	other	ADJ	Degree=Pos	20 each	fixed

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	is	present	the trees			short property	tree rules
2	need	to-infinitive	the trees not said here	deep roots			vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot root=Theme
3	not grow	present	trees = tree	roots = root			vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location they=Theme
4	lean	present	trees = tree not said here		each		vn assuming_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on each=Location

Option 4

Their roots are too lazy

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	2 roots	nmod:poss
2	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 lazy	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 lazy	cop
4	too	too	ADV	_	5 lazy	advmod
5	lazy	lazy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	Their roots					lazy property	tree rules

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/157-the-amazon-forest-floor/t9/