Exam question 2 · Andersen, The Philosopher's Stone, part 150: the Seer's ey…

To what extent did the Hearer's faculty of hearing serve his original purpose?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: extent, faculty · What happens: do, serve, purpose · To what, where: original purpose

This is exam question 2 of lesson 939 «Andersen, The Philosopher's Stone, part 150: the Seer's eyes are clouded, the Hearer's ears burst, and the third brother sets out» of the books 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	To	to	ADP	_	2 what	case
2	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	4 did	obj
3	extent	extent	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 did	nsubj
4	did	do	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 Hearer	det
6	Hearer	Hearer	PROPN	Number=Sing	8 faculty	nmod:poss
7	's	's	PART	_	6 Hearer	case
8	faculty	faculty	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 serve	nsubj
9	of	of	ADP	_	10 hearing	case
10	hearing	hearing	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 faculty	nmod
11	serve	serve	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 did	ccomp
12	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	14 purpose	nmod:poss
13	original	original	ADJ	Degree=Pos	14 purpose	amod
14	purpose	purpose	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 serve	obj
15	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 did	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	do	past	extent		tree rules
2	serve	present	the Hearer's faculty of hearing	faculty's original purpose	vn masquerade-29.6-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent purpose=Attribute
3	purpose		faculty		nom purpose «cognition intransitive»: poss=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 · ← Mova's choice

It failed completely

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	2 failed	nsubj
2	failed	fail	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	completely	completely	ADV	_	2 failed	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	fail	past	It					completely property	vn succeed-74-3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 2

It served him well, though the noise sometimes made him tired and sad at night

The tree, 15 words

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	2 served	nsubj
2	served	serve	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 served	obj
4	well	well	ADV	Degree=Pos	2 served	advmod
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 made	punct
6	though	though	SCONJ	_	10 made	mark
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 noise	det
8	noise	noise	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 made	nsubj
9	sometimes	sometimes	ADV	PronType=Ind	10 made	advmod
10	made	make	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 served	conj
11	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	10 made	obj
12	tired	tired	ADJ	Degree=Pos	10 made	xcomp
13	and	and	CCONJ	_	14 sad	cc
14	sad	sad	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 tired	conj
15	at	at	ADP	_	16 night	case
16	night	night	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 made	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	serve	past	It	him = he				well property	vn masquerade-29.6-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Attribute
2	make	past	the noise	him = he			night	sometimes, tired property	vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset he=Product

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

It failed, because the noise rendered him unable to acquire knowledge

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	2 failed	nsubj
2	failed	fail	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	,	,	PUNCT	_	7 rendered	punct
4	because	because	SCONJ	_	7 rendered	mark
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 noise	det
6	noise	noise	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 rendered	nsubj
7	rendered	render	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 failed	conj
8	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 rendered	obj
9	unable	unable	ADJ	Degree=Pos	7 rendered	xcomp
10	to	to	PART	_	11 acquire	mark
11	acquire	acquire	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	9 unable	xcomp
12	knowledge	knowledge	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 acquire	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	fail	past	It			vn succeed-74-3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
2	render	past	the noise	him = he	unable property	vn give-13.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Theme
3	acquire	to-infinitive	the noise not said here	knowledge		vn obtain-13.5.2-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset knowledge=Theme

Option 4

It worked fine

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	2 worked	nsubj
2	worked	work	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	fine	fine	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 worked	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	work	past	It					fine property	vn employment-95.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent

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/books/939-pg27200-part150/e2/