Test 7 · ★★ · Whales

Why do you think scientists study the up-and-down beat of a whale's tail as a clue to its past?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you, scientists · What happens: think, study · To what, where: up · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 7 · ★★ of lesson 26 «Whales» 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	4 think	advmod
2	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 think	aux
3	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	4 think	nsubj
4	think	think	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	scientists	scientist	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 study	nsubj
6	study	study	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 think	ccomp
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 up	det
8	up	up	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 study	obj
9	-	-	PUNCT	_	13 beat	punct
10	and	and	CCONJ	_	13 beat	cc
11	-	-	PUNCT	_	10 and	punct
12	down	down	ADV	_	13 beat	advmod
13	beat	beat	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 up	appos
14	of	of	ADP	_	18 tail	case
15	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	16 whale	det
16	whale	whale	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 tail	nmod:poss
17	's	's	PART	_	16 whale	case
18	tail	tail	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 beat	nmod
19	as	as	ADP	_	21 clue	case
20	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	21 clue	det
21	clue	clue	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 tail	nmod
22	to	to	ADP	_	24 past	case
23	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	24 past	nmod:poss
24	past	past	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 clue	nmod
25	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 think	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	think speech: other	present · do-support	you						vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme
2	study	present	scientists	the up					vn learn-14-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent up=Topic

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

Whales copied it from fish

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Whales	whale	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 copied	nsubj
2	copied	copy	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 copied	obj
4	from	from	ADP	_	5 fish	case
5	fish	fish	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 copied	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	copy	past	Whales	it				from fish	vn scribble-25.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

It is how its land-running ancestors' backbones bent

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 how	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 how	cop
3	how	how	ADV	PronType=Int	root	root
4	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	10 backbones	nmod:poss
5	land	land	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 running	compound
6	-	-	PUNCT	_	5 land	punct
7	running	run	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	10 backbones	amod
8	ancestors	ancestor	NOUN	Number=Plur	10 backbones	nmod:poss
9	'	's	PART	_	8 ancestors	case
10	backbones	backbone	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 bent	nsubj:pass
11	bent	bend	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 how	advcl:relcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	is	present	It		how property	tree rules
2	run	gerund				vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
3	bend	participle · passive		its running backbones		vn knead-26.5 «NP V NP.material»: subject=Material

Option 3

It shows how deep the whale can dive

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 shows	nsubj
2	shows	show	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	how	how	ADV	PronType=Int	4 deep	advmod
4	deep	deep	ADV	_	8 dive	advmod
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 whale	det
6	whale	whale	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 dive	nsubj
7	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	8 dive	aux
8	dive	dive	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 shows	ccomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	show	present	It						vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	dive	can	the whale					deep property	vn calibratable_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute

Option 4

It is the only way to swim at all

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 way	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 way	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 way	det
4	only	only	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 way	amod
5	way	way	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	to	to	PART	_	7 swim	mark
7	swim	swim	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 way	acl
8	at	at	ADP	_	9 all	case
9	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	7 swim	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	It	the only way					tree rules
2	swim	to-infinitive				all			vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme at all=Trajectory

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/26-whales/t7/