Test 6 · Today, tomorrow, now, later

why does English need four words "the day after tomorrow" when Chinese has one?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 4 · right ✓ · Who acts: English, Chinese · What happens: need, have · To what, where: four words, one

This is test 6 of lesson 21 «Today, tomorrow, now, later» of the Chinese street 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	4 need	advmod
2	does	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 English	aux
3	English	English	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 need	nsubj
4	need	need	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	15 has	advcl
5	four	four	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	6 words	nummod
6	words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 need	obj
7	"	"	PUNCT	_	6 words	punct
8	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 day	det
9	day	day	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 need	obl:unmarked
10	after	after	ADP	_	11 tomorrow	case
11	tomorrow	tomorrow	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 need	obl
12	"	"	PUNCT	_	11 tomorrow	punct
13	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	15 has	advmod
14	Chinese	Chinese	PROPN	Number=Sing	15 has	nsubj
15	has	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
16	one	one	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	15 has	obj
17	?	?	PUNCT	_	15 has	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	need	present	English	four words			day; tomorrow		vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot word=Theme
2	have	present	Chinese	one					vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent one=Patient

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

Chinese is a shorter language overall

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Chinese	Chinese	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 language	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 language	cop
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	5 language	det
4	shorter	short	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	5 language	amod
5	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	overall	overall	ADV	_	5 language	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	Chinese	a shorter language				overall property	tree rules

Option 2

English is older, so its words are long

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	English	English	PROPN	Number=Sing	3 older	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 older	cop
3	older	old	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
4	,	,	PUNCT	_	9 long	punct
5	so	so	ADV	_	9 long	advmod
6	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	7 words	nmod:poss
7	words	word	NOUN	Number=Plur	9 long	nsubj
8	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	9 long	cop
9	long	long	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 older	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	other	roles by
1	is	present	English	old property	tree rules
2	is	present	its words	long property	tree rules
3	word		its = it		nom word «communication transitive»: poss=agent

Option 3

Chinese has no word either

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Chinese	Chinese	PROPN	Number=Sing	2 has	nsubj
2	has	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	4 word	det
4	word	word	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 has	obj
5	either	either	ADV	PronType=Ind	2 has	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	have	present	Chinese	no word				either property	vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent word=Patient

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

English just has no single word for it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	English	English	PROPN	Number=Sing	3 has	nsubj
2	just	just	ADV	_	3 has	advmod
3	has	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	6 word	det
5	single	single	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 word	amod
6	word	word	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 has	obj
7	for	for	ADP	_	8 it	case
8	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 word	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	have	present	English	no single word				for word	vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent word=Patient

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/chinese-street/21-today-tomorrow-now-later/t6/