Test 12 · ★★ · Animals in the news: true stories, fakes and how to read t…

«wildlife down 73%, so 3 out of 4 animals are dead» Why should you read numbers in the news carefully?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: wildlife, you · What happens: be, read · To what, where: numbers, news · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 12 · ★★ of lesson 296 «Animals in the news: true stories, fakes and how to read them» 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	_	2 wildlife	punct
2	wildlife	wildlife	NOUN	Number=Sing	14 dead	nsubj
3	down	down	ADV	_	5 %	advmod
4	73	73	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	5 %	nummod
5	%	%	SYM	Number=Sing	2 wildlife	nmod
6	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 3	punct
7	so	so	ADV	_	8 3	advmod
8	3	3	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	14 dead	nsubj
9	out	out	ADP	_	12 animals	case
10	of	of	ADP	_	12 animals	case
11	4	4	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	12 animals	nummod
12	animals	animal	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 3	nmod
13	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	14 dead	cop
14	dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
15	»	»	PUNCT	_	14 dead	punct
16	Why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	19 read	advmod
17	should	should	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	19 read	aux
18	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	19 read	nsubj
19	read	read	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	14 dead	parataxis
20	numbers	number	NOUN	Number=Plur	19 read	obj
21	in	in	ADP	_	23 news	case
22	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	23 news	det
23	news	news	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 read	obl
24	carefully	carefully	ADV	_	19 read	advmod
25	?	?	PUNCT	_	14 dead	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is in a quote	present	wildlife					dead property	tree rules
2	read	should	you	numbers		the news		carefully property	vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent number=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

Because 73 is bigger than 100

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	ADP	ExtPos=ADP	2 73	case
2	73	73	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	4 bigger	obl
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 bigger	cop
4	bigger	big	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
5	than	than	ADP	_	6 100	case
6	100	100	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	4 bigger	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present						because 73; than 100; big property	tree rules

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

Because news numbers are always made up

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	6 made	mark
2	news	news	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 numbers	compound
3	numbers	number	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 made	nsubj:pass
4	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	6 made	aux:pass
5	always	always	ADV	PronType=Tot	6 made	advmod
6	made	make	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
7	up	up	ADP	_	6 made	compound:prt

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	make up	present · passive		news numbers				always property	vn comprise-107.2-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Pivot

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

It is an average of population changes, not a count of dead animals

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	4 average	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 average	cop
3	an	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	4 average	det
4	average	average	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
5	of	of	ADP	_	7 changes	case
6	population	population	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 changes	compound
7	changes	change	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 average	nmod
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 count	punct
9	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	11 count	advmod
10	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	11 count	det
11	count	count	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 average	conj
12	of	of	ADP	_	14 animals	case
13	dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	14 animals	amod
14	animals	animal	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 count	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	It	a average and a count of dead animals				of population changes	tree rules

Option 4

Because wild animals cannot be counted at all, so every number is a guess

The tree, 15 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	7 counted	mark
2	wild	wild	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 animals	amod
3	animals	animal	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 counted	nsubj:pass
4	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	7 counted	aux
5	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	7 counted	advmod
6	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	7 counted	aux:pass
7	counted	count	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
8	at	at	ADP	_	9 all	case
9	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	7 counted	obl
10	,	,	PUNCT	_	16 guess	punct
11	so	so	ADV	_	16 guess	advmod
12	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	13 number	det
13	number	number	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 guess	nsubj
14	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	16 guess	cop
15	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	16 guess	det
16	guess	guess	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 counted	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not count	can · passive		wild animals		all			vn multiply-108 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme
2	is a	present	every number	a guess					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/296-animals-in-the-news-true-stories-fakes-and-how-to-read-them/t12/