Test 7 · ★★ · Animal myths put right: elephants and mice, lemmings, ostr…

Why do people keep telling the myth that a bird will reject a touched chick?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: people, bird · What happens: keep, tell, reject, touch · To what, where: myth, touched chick · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 7 · ★★ of lesson 295 «Animal myths put right: elephants and mice, lemmings, ostriches and goldfish» 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 keep	advmod
2	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 keep	aux
3	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 keep	nsubj
4	keep	keep	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	telling	tell	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	4 keep	xcomp
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 myth	det
7	myth	myth	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 telling	obj
8	that	that	SCONJ	_	12 reject	mark
9	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	10 bird	det
10	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 reject	nsubj
11	will	will	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	12 reject	aux
12	reject	reject	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 myth	acl
13	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	15 chick	det
14	touched	touch	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	15 chick	amod
15	chick	chick	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 reject	obj
16	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 keep	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	keep	present · do-support	people		tree rules
2	tell speech: assert	gerund	people not said here	the myth	vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent myth=Recipient
3	reject	future	a bird	a touched chick	vn reject-77.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent chick=Theme
4	touch	participle			vn contiguous_location-47.8-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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

Because birds can smell far better than dogs, and every bird checks its chicks

The tree, 14 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	4 smell	mark
2	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 smell	nsubj
3	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 smell	aux
4	smell	smell	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	far	far	ADV	Degree=Pos	6 better	advmod
6	better	good	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	4 smell	advmod
7	than	than	ADP	_	8 dogs	case
8	dogs	dog	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 better	obl
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	13 checks	punct
10	and	and	CCONJ	_	13 checks	cc
11	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	12 bird	det
12	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 checks	nsubj
13	checks	check	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 smell	conj
14	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	15 chicks	nmod:poss
15	chicks	chick	NOUN	Number=Plur	13 checks	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	smell	can	birds						vn smell_emission-43.3 «NP.location V»: agent=Location
2	check	present	every bird	its chicks					vn assessment-34.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent chick=Theme

Option 2

Because scientists proved it long ago

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	3 proved	mark
2	scientists	scientist	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 proved	nsubj
3	proved	prove	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 proved	obj
5	long	long	ADV	Degree=Pos	6 ago	advmod
6	ago	ago	ADV	_	3 proved	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	prove	past	scientists	it				ago property	vn deduce-97.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

It keeps children from picking up wild babies, which is a good thing

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 keeps	nsubj
2	keeps	keep	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	children	child	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 keeps	obj
4	from	from	SCONJ	_	5 picking	mark
5	picking	pick	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 keeps	advcl
6	up	up	ADP	_	5 picking	compound:prt
7	wild	wild	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 babies	amod
8	babies	baby	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 picking	obj
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	14 thing	punct
10	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	14 thing	nsubj
11	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	14 thing	cop
12	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	14 thing	det
13	good	good	ADJ	Degree=Pos	14 thing	amod
14	thing	thing	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 babies	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	keep	present	It	children	vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent child=Theme
2	pick up	gerund		wild babies and a good thing	vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent baby=Topic
3	is a	present	wild babies and a good thing	a good thing	tree rules

Option 4

Because it is true for every bird

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	4 true	mark
2	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 true	nsubj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 true	cop
4	true	true	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	for	for	ADP	_	7 bird	case
6	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	7 bird	det
7	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 true	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	it					for every bird; true 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/295-animal-myths-put-right-elephants-and-mice-lemmings-ostriches-and-goldfish/t7/