Exam question 1 · Birds of prey and owls

Identify the principal reason for which an owl rotates its head rather than its eyes.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you, owl · What happens: identify, rotate · To what, where: principal reason, head

This is exam question 1 of lesson 34 «Birds of prey and owls» of the biology course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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	Identify	identify	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 reason	det
3	principal	principal	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 reason	amod
4	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Identify	obj
5	for	for	ADP	_	6 which	case
6	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	9 rotates	obl
7	an	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	8 owl	det
8	owl	owl	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 rotates	nsubj
9	rotates	rotate	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 reason	parataxis
10	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	11 head	nmod:poss
11	head	head	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 rotates	obj
12	rather	rather	ADV	ExtPos=CCONJ	15 eyes	cc
13	than	than	ADP	_	12 rather	fixed
14	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	15 eyes	nmod:poss
15	eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	9 rotates	conj
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Identify	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	identify	imperative	you not said here	the principal reason					vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent reason=Theme
2	rotate	present	a owl	owl's head				for the principal reason	vn modes_of_being_with_motion-47.3 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location head=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 · ← Mova's choice

The neck possesses no bones

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 neck	det
2	neck	neck	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 possesses	nsubj
3	possesses	possess	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	5 bones	det
5	bones	bone	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 possesses	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	possess	present	the neck	no bones					vn own-100.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot bone=Theme

Option 2

The eyes are sensitive to rotation

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 eyes	det
2	eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 sensitive	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 sensitive	cop
4	sensitive	sensitive	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	to	to	ADP	_	6 rotation	case
6	rotation	rotation	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 sensitive	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the eyes					to rotation; sensitive property	tree rules

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

The eyes are tubular and fixed within the skull

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 eyes	det
2	eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 tubular	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 tubular	cop
4	tubular	tubular	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	and	and	CCONJ	_	6 fixed	cc
6	fixed	fix	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	4 tubular	conj
7	within	within	ADP	_	9 skull	case
8	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 skull	det
9	skull	skull	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 fixed	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the eyes					tubular property	tree rules
2	fix	participle	the eyes not said here					within the skull	vn shake-22.3-2 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Patient

Option 4

The eyes are entirely absent in the nocturnal species

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 eyes	det
2	eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 absent	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 absent	cop
4	entirely	entirely	ADV	_	5 absent	advmod
5	absent	absent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
6	in	in	ADP	_	9 species	case
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 species	det
8	nocturnal	nocturnal	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 species	amod
9	species	species	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 absent	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the eyes			the nocturnal species		absent, entirely 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/34-birds-of-prey-and-owls/e1/