Exam question 1 · Carnivorous and strange plants

Identify the principal reason for which carnivorous plants capture animal prey.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you, carnivorous plants · What happens: identify, capture · To what, where: principal reason, animal prey

This is exam question 1 of lesson 61 «Carnivorous and strange plants» 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 capture	obl
7	carnivorous	carnivorous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 plants	amod
8	plants	plant	NOUN	Number=Plur	9 capture	nsubj
9	capture	capture	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 reason	acl:relcl
10	animal	animal	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 prey	compound
11	prey	prey	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 capture	obj
12	.	.	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	capture	present	carnivorous plants	animal prey				for the principal reason	vn steal-10.5-1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent prey=Theme for which=Beneficiary

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

To supply themselves with water in drought

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 supply	mark
2	supply	supply	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	themselves	themselves	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs Reflex=Yes	2 supply	obj
4	with	with	ADP	_	5 water	case
5	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 supply	obl
6	in	in	ADP	_	7 drought	case
7	drought	drought	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 supply	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	supply	to-infinitive		themselves = they		drought		with water	vn fulfilling-13.4.1-1 «NP V NP-Fulfilling PP.theme»: agent=Agent themselves=Recipient with water=Theme

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

To obtain nitrogen and minerals scarce in their boggy habitat

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 obtain	mark
2	obtain	obtain	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 scarce	advcl
3	nitrogen	nitrogen	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 obtain	obj
4	and	and	CCONJ	_	5 minerals	cc
5	minerals	mineral	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 nitrogen	conj
6	scarce	scarce	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
7	in	in	ADP	_	10 habitat	case
8	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	10 habitat	nmod:poss
9	boggy	boggy	ADJ	Degree=Pos	10 habitat	amod
10	habitat	habitat	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 scarce	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	obtain	to-infinitive		nitrogen and minerals					vn obtain-13.5.2-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset nitrogen=Theme
2	scarce	present				minerals's boggy habitat			tree rules

Option 3

To obtain all the energy required for growth, sunlight being insufficient

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 obtain	mark
2	obtain	obtain	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	12 insufficient	advcl
3	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	5 energy	det:predet
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 energy	det
5	energy	energy	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 obtain	obj
6	required	require	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	5 energy	acl
7	for	for	ADP	_	8 growth	case
8	growth	growth	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 required	obl
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 sunlight	punct
10	sunlight	sunlight	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 obtain	obl
11	being	be	AUX	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	12 insufficient	cop
12	insufficient	insufficient	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	what, whom	other	roles by
1	obtain	to-infinitive	all energy	sunlight obl	vn obtain-13.5.2-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset energy=Theme
2	require	participle	all energy not said here	for growth	vn require-103-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Theme
3	is	gerund		insufficient property	tree rules

Option 4

To defend their flowers from insect damage

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 defend	mark
2	defend	defend	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	4 flowers	nmod:poss
4	flowers	flower	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 defend	obj
5	from	from	ADP	_	7 damage	case
6	insect	insect	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 damage	compound
7	damage	damage	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 defend	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	defend	to-infinitive		their flowers				from insect damage	vn defend-72.3 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent flower=Beneficiary from damage=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/61-carnivorous-and-strange-plants/e1/