Test 11 · The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real animals behind the signs

Why might a wolf that was less shy do better near a human camp long ago?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: wolf · What happens: be, do · To what, where: human camp

This is test 11 of lesson 382 «The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real animals behind the signs» 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	9 do	advmod
2	might	might	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	9 do	aux
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	4 wolf	det
4	wolf	wolf	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 do	nsubj
5	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	8 shy	nsubj
6	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 shy	cop
7	less	less	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	8 shy	amod
8	shy	shy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 wolf	acl:relcl
9	do	do	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	16 ago	advcl
10	better	well	ADV	Degree=Cmp	9 do	advmod
11	near	near	ADP	_	14 camp	case
12	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	14 camp	det
13	human	human	ADJ	Degree=Pos	14 camp	amod
14	camp	camp	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 do	obl
15	long	long	ADV	Degree=Pos	16 ago	advmod
16	ago	ago	ADV	_	root	root
17	?	?	PUNCT	_	16 ago	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	a wolf					shy property	tree rules
2	do	might	a wolf			a human camp		well property	vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

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

People fed only shy wolves

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	People	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 fed	nsubj
2	fed	feed	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	only	only	ADV	_	5 wolves	advmod
4	shy	shy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 wolves	amod
5	wolves	wolf	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 fed	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	feed	past	People	shy wolves					vn feeding-39.7 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wolf=Recipient

Option 2

It could steal the people's clothes

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 steal	nsubj
2	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 steal	aux
3	steal	steal	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 people	det
5	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 clothes	nmod:poss
6	's	's	PART	_	5 people	case
7	clothes	clothes	NOUN	Number=Ptan	3 steal	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	steal	could	It	the people's clothes					vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location clothes=Theme

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice

It could hunt people more easily

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 hunt	nsubj
2	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 hunt	aux
3	hunt	hunt	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 hunt	obj
5	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	6 easily	advmod
6	easily	easily	ADV	_	3 hunt	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	hunt	could	It	people				easily property	vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent people=Theme

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

It could eat scraps and stay safe near people

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 eat	nsubj
2	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 eat	aux
3	eat	eat	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	scraps	scrap	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 eat	obj
5	and	and	CCONJ	_	6 stay	cc
6	stay	stay	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 eat	conj
7	safe	safe	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 stay	xcomp
8	near	near	ADP	_	9 people	case
9	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 stay	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	eat	could	It	scraps					vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent scrap=Patient
2	stay	infinitive						near people; safe property	vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme near people=Location

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/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/t11/