Test 3 · How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry

If polar bear fur is not really white, why does it look white to us?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 4 · right ✓ · Who acts: bear fur, it · What happens: not be, look

This is test 3 of lesson 51 «How animals hide: camouflage and mimicry» 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	If	if	SCONJ	_	8 white	mark
2	polar	polar	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 bear	amod
3	bear	bear	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 fur	compound
4	fur	fur	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 white	nsubj
5	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	8 white	cop
6	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	8 white	advmod
7	really	really	ADV	_	8 white	advmod
8	white	white	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 look	advcl
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 white	punct
10	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	13 look	advmod
11	does	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	13 look	aux
12	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	13 look	nsubj
13	look	look	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
14	white	white	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 look	xcomp
15	to	to	ADP	_	16 us	case
16	us	we	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=1 PronType=Prs	14 white	obl
17	?	?	PUNCT	_	13 look	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not is a condition, not said to happen	present	bear fur					white property	tree rules
2	look	present · do-support	it					white property	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus

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

The ice reflects off it just like a mirror

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 ice	det
2	ice	ice	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 reflects	nsubj
3	reflects	reflect	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	off	off	ADP	_	5 it	case
5	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 reflects	obl
6	just	just	ADV	_	9 mirror	advmod
7	like	like	ADP	_	9 mirror	case
8	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	9 mirror	det
9	mirror	mirror	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 reflects	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	reflect	present	the ice					off it; like a mirror	vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 2

The bear rolls in fresh snow every morning

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 bear	det
2	bear	bear	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 rolls	nsubj
3	rolls	roll	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	in	in	ADP	_	6 snow	case
5	fresh	fresh	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 snow	amod
6	snow	snow	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 rolls	obl
7	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	8 morning	det
8	morning	morning	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 rolls	obl:unmarked

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	roll	present	the bear			fresh snow	morning		vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in snow=Trajectory

Option 3

The black skin shines through it as white

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 skin	det
2	black	black	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 skin	amod
3	skin	skin	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 shines	nsubj
4	shines	shine	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	through	through	ADP	_	6 it	case
6	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 shines	obl
7	as	as	ADP	_	8 white	case
8	white	white	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 shines	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	shine	present	the black skin			it		as white	vn light_emission-43.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through it=Location

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

The clear hollow hairs scatter the light

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 hairs	det
2	clear	clear	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 hairs	amod
3	hollow	hollow	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 hairs	amod
4	hairs	hair	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 scatter	nsubj
5	scatter	scatter	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 light	det
7	light	light	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 scatter	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	scatter	present	the clear hollow hairs	the light					vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent light=Theme

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/51-how-animals-hide/t3/