Test 2 · Plants deeper: the oldest, tallest and strangest trees

«why don't trees just keep growing taller forever» What is the best answer?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: best answer · What happens: do, keep, grow, be · To what, where: trees

This is test 2 of lesson 253 «Plants deeper: the oldest, tallest and strangest trees» 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	_	3 do	punct
2	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	3 do	advmod
3	do	do	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	n't	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	5 trees	advmod
5	trees	tree	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 do	obj
6	just	just	ADV	_	7 keep	advmod
7	keep	keep	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 do	advcl
8	growing	grow	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	7 keep	xcomp
9	taller	tall	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	8 growing	xcomp
10	forever	forever	ADV	_	8 growing	advmod
11	»	»	PUNCT	_	8 growing	punct
12	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	8 growing	obl
13	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	12 What	cop
14	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	16 answer	det
15	best	good	ADJ	Degree=Sup	16 answer	amod
16	answer	answer	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 What	nsubj
17	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 do	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	do in a quote	present		trees		vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent tree=Eventuality
2	keep in a quote	present				tree rules
3	grow in a quote	gerund			forever, tall property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
4	is a	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 · ← Mova's choice

They hit the clouds

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	2 hit	nsubj
2	hit	hit	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 clouds	det
4	clouds	cloud	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 hit	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	hit	past	They	the clouds					vn contiguous_location-47.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme cloud=Co-Theme

Option 2

The wind cuts off the tops each year and they have to start again from the bottom

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	2 wind	det
2	wind	wind	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 cuts	nsubj
3	cuts	cut	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	off	off	ADP	_	3 cuts	compound:prt
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 tops	det
6	tops	top	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 cuts	obj
7	each	each	DET	PronType=Tot	8 year	det
8	year	year	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 cuts	obl:unmarked
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	11 have	cc
10	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 have	nsubj
11	have	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 cuts	conj
12	to	to	PART	_	13 start	mark
13	start	start	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	11 have	xcomp
14	again	again	ADV	_	13 start	advmod
15	from	from	ADP	_	17 bottom	case
16	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	17 bottom	det
17	bottom	bottom	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 start	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	roles by
1	cut off	present	the wind	the tops		year	vn stop-55.4-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Affector top=Eventuality
2	have	present	tops = top				tree rules
3	start	to-infinitive	tops = top not said here		the bottom	again	vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Water cannot be pulled up high enough fast enough above about 120 to 130 metres

The tree, 16 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 pulled	nsubj:pass
2	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 pulled	aux
3	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	5 pulled	advmod
4	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	5 pulled	aux:pass
5	pulled	pull	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
6	up	up	ADP	_	5 pulled	compound:prt
7	high	high	ADV	Degree=Pos	5 pulled	advmod
8	enough	enough	ADV	_	5 pulled	advmod
9	fast	fast	ADV	Degree=Pos	5 pulled	advmod
10	enough	enough	ADV	_	5 pulled	advmod
11	above	above	ADP	_	16 metres	case
12	about	about	ADV	_	13 120	advmod
13	120	120	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	16 metres	nummod
14	to	to	ADP	_	15 130	case
15	130	130	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	13 120	nmod
16	metres	metre	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 pulled	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not pull up	can · passive		Water		120 metres		enough, fast, high property	vn push-12-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme

Option 4

Birds land on the tops and break them

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 land	nsubj
2	land	land	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	on	on	ADP	_	5 tops	case
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 tops	det
5	tops	top	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 land	obl
6	and	and	CCONJ	_	7 break	cc
7	break	break	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 land	conj
8	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 break	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	land	present	Birds			the tops			vn pocket-9.10-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent on top=Destination
2	break	infinitive	Birds not said here	Birds = bird					vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer they=Patient

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/253-plants-deeper-the-oldest-tallest-and-strangest-trees/t2/