Test 8 · The microscopic world: cells, the building blocks of life

Why did no one know about tiny living things in water before the 1600s?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: one · What happens: know

This is test 8 of lesson 256 «The microscopic world: cells, the building blocks of life» 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	Why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	5 know	advmod
2	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 know	aux
3	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	4 one	det
4	one	one	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 know	nsubj
5	know	know	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	about	about	ADP	_	9 things	case
7	tiny	tiny	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 things	amod
8	living	living	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 things	amod
9	things	thing	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 know	obl
10	in	in	ADP	_	11 water	case
11	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 things	nmod
12	before	before	ADP	_	14 1600s	case
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	14 1600s	det
14	1600s	1600	NOUN	Number=Ptan NumForm=Combi NumType=Card	5 know	obl
15	?	?	PUNCT	_	5 know	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	know	past · do-support	no one				before the 1600s	about tiny living things in water	vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V PP.stimulus»: agent=Experiencer about thing=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

People thought looking at water was rude

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	People	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 thought	nsubj
2	thought	think	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	looking	look	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	7 rude	csubj
4	at	at	ADP	_	5 water	case
5	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 looking	obl
6	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 rude	cop
7	rude	rude	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 thought	ccomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	other	roles by
1	think speech: other	past	People		vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
2	look	gerund		at water	vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent at water=Theme
3	is	past	looking	rude property	tree rules

Option 2

Water was always boiled before

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 boiled	nsubj:pass
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 boiled	aux:pass
3	always	always	ADV	PronType=Tot	4 boiled	advmod
4	boiled	boil	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
5	before	before	ADV	_	4 boiled	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	boil	past · passive		Water				always, before property	vn cooking-45.3 «NP V NP.patient»: subject=Patient

Option 3

They did not exist before then

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 exist	nsubj
2	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 exist	aux
3	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	4 exist	advmod
4	exist	exist	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	before	before	ADP	_	6 then	case
6	then	then	ADV	PronType=Dem	4 exist	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not exist	past · do-support	They						vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme before then=Location

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

Without microscopes they were too small to see

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Without	without	ADP	_	2 microscopes	case
2	microscopes	microscope	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root
3	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 small	nsubj
4	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	6 small	cop
5	too	too	ADV	_	6 small	advmod
6	small	small	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 microscopes	acl:relcl
7	to	to	PART	_	8 see	mark
8	see	see	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 small	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	microscopes = microscope	microscopes not said here				small property	tree rules
2	see	to-infinitive	microscopes = microscope not said here						vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: 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.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/biology/256-the-microscopic-world-cells-the-building-blocks-of-life/t8/