Exam question 4 · Plastic bags, medicines and chemicals

Ascertain why medicine ought always to be referred to as medicine, and never as sweets or candy.

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 4 · right ✓ · Who acts: you · What happens: ascertain, refer · To what, where: medicine

This is exam question 4 of lesson 114 «Plastic bags, medicines and chemicals» of the everyday 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	Ascertain	ascertain	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	8 referred	advmod
3	medicine	medicine	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 referred	nsubj:pass
4	ought	ought	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	8 referred	aux
5	always	always	ADV	PronType=Tot	8 referred	advmod
6	to	to	PART	_	8 referred	mark
7	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	8 referred	aux:pass
8	referred	refer	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	1 Ascertain	advcl
9	to	to	ADP	_	8 referred	obl
10	as	as	ADP	_	11 medicine	case
11	medicine	medicine	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 referred	obl
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	16 sweets	punct
13	and	and	CCONJ	_	16 sweets	cc
14	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	16 sweets	advmod
15	as	as	ADP	_	16 sweets	case
16	sweets	sweet	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 Ascertain	parataxis
17	or	or	CCONJ	_	18 candy	cc
18	candy	candy	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 sweets	conj
19	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Ascertain	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	ascertain	imperative	you not said here						vn discover-84 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent
2	refer	ought · passive		medicine				as medicine; always property	vn contribute-13.2 «NP V NP.theme (PP)»: subject=Theme

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

So that the medicine has a more pleasant taste

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	So	so	ADV	_	5 has	advmod
2	that	that	SCONJ	_	5 has	mark
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 medicine	det
4	medicine	medicine	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 has	nsubj
5	has	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	9 taste	det
7	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	8 pleasant	advmod
8	pleasant	pleasant	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 taste	amod
9	taste	taste	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 has	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	have	present	the medicine	a pleasant taste					vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent taste=Patient

Option 2

Because it is unlawful to describe it as candy

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	4 unlawful	mark
2	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 unlawful	nsubj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 unlawful	cop
4	unlawful	unlawful	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	6 describe	mark
6	describe	describe	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 unlawful	xcomp
7	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 describe	obj
8	as	as	ADP	_	9 candy	case
9	candy	candy	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 describe	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	it					unlawful property	tree rules
2	describe	to-infinitive		it				as candy	vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent it=Theme as candy=Attribute

Option 3

Because sweets are more harmful than medicine

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	5 harmful	mark
2	sweets	sweet	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 harmful	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 harmful	cop
4	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	5 harmful	advmod
5	harmful	harmful	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
6	than	than	ADP	_	7 medicine	case
7	medicine	medicine	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 harmful	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	sweets					than medicine; harmful property	tree rules

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

So children do not seek it out to eat more

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	So	so	ADV	_	5 seek	advmod
2	children	child	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 seek	nsubj
3	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 seek	aux
4	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	5 seek	advmod
5	seek	seek	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
6	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 seek	obj
7	out	out	ADP	_	5 seek	compound:prt
8	to	to	PART	_	9 eat	mark
9	eat	eat	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 seek	advcl
10	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	9 eat	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not seek out	present · do-support	children	it					vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme
2	eat	to-infinitive	children not said here						vn eat-39.1-1 «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/everyday/114-bags-medicines-and-chemicals/e4/