Test 4 · Deserts

«why'd camels be better than horses in the desert, horses are faster» Which is the best answer?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: camels, horses · What happens: be · To what, where: best answer · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 4 of lesson 18 «Deserts» of the geography 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	«	«	PUNCT	_	6 better	punct
2	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	6 better	advmod
3	'd	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	6 better	aux
4	camels	camel	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 better	nsubj
5	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	6 better	cop
6	better	good	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
7	than	than	ADP	_	8 horses	case
8	horses	horse	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 better	obl
9	in	in	ADP	_	11 desert	case
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 desert	det
11	desert	desert	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 horses	nmod
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	15 faster	punct
13	horses	horse	NOUN	Number=Plur	15 faster	nsubj
14	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	15 faster	cop
15	faster	fast	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	6 better	conj
16	»	»	PUNCT	_	15 faster	punct
17	Which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	21 answer	nsubj
18	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	21 answer	cop
19	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	21 answer	det
20	best	good	ADJ	Degree=Sup	21 answer	amod
21	answer	answer	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 better	parataxis
22	?	?	PUNCT	_	6 better	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	is in a quote	would	camels		than horses in the desert; good property	tree rules
2	is in a quote	present	horses		fast property	tree rules
3	be speech: assert	present		the best answer		tree rules

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

Camels are faster than horses

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Camels	camel	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 faster	nsubj
2	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 faster	cop
3	faster	fast	ADV	Degree=Cmp	root	root
4	than	than	ADP	_	5 horses	case
5	horses	horse	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 faster	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	Camels					than horses; fast property	tree rules

Option 2

Horses cannot walk on sand at all, they sink straight in up to their knees

The tree, 16 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Horses	horse	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 walk	nsubj
2	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 walk	aux
3	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	4 walk	advmod
4	walk	walk	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	on	on	ADP	_	6 sand	case
6	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 walk	obl
7	at	at	ADP	_	8 all	case
8	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	4 walk	obl
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 sink	punct
10	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 sink	nsubj
11	sink	sink	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 walk	parataxis
12	straight	straight	ADV	_	14 up	advmod
13	in	in	ADP	_	14 up	case
14	up	up	ADV	_	11 sink	advmod
15	to	to	ADP	_	17 knees	case
16	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	17 knees	nmod:poss
17	knees	knee	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 sink	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not walk	can	Horses			sand		at all	vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on sand=Trajectory
2	sink	present	Horses = horse					to Horses's knees	vn other_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

Camels go much longer without water and cope with heat and sand

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Camels	camel	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 go	nsubj
2	go	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	much	much	ADV	_	4 longer	advmod
4	longer	long	ADV	Degree=Cmp	2 go	advmod
5	without	without	ADP	_	6 water	case
6	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 go	obl
7	and	and	CCONJ	_	8 cope	cc
8	cope	cope	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	2 go	conj
9	with	with	ADP	_	10 heat	case
10	heat	heat	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 cope	obl
11	and	and	CCONJ	_	12 sand	cc
12	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 heat	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	go	present	Camels					without water; long property	vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	cope	present	Camels not said here					with heat and sand	vn cope-83-1 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent with heat=Theme

Option 4

Camels eat sand

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Camels	camel	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 eat	nsubj
2	eat	eat	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	sand	sand	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 eat	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	eat	present	Camels	sand					vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sand=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/geography/18-deserts/t4/