Test 10 · Starving, a million times and a ton: everyday hyperbole
★★★ Leo had lunch at 12:00 and at 3:30 shouts «I haven't eaten in like a hundred years». How long has it really been since he ate?
Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: ★, lunch · What happens: have, shout, not eat in, be · To what, where: lunch, 12:00, 3:30 · Speech: someone speaks here
This is test 10 of lesson 44 «Starving, a million times and a ton: everyday hyperbole» of the language 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
Sentence 1: ★★★ Leo had lunch at 12:00 and at 3:30 shouts «I haven't eaten in like a hundred years».
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ★ | ★ | PROPN | Number=Sing | 5 had | nsubj |
| 2 | ★ | ★ | X | Foreign=Yes | 1 ★ | dep |
| 3 | ★ | ★ | ADP | _ | 4 Leo | case |
| 4 | Leo | Leo | PROPN | Number=Sing | 1 ★ | nmod |
| 5 | had | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 6 | lunch | lunch | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 had | obj |
| 7 | at | at | ADP | _ | 8 12:00 | case |
| 8 | 12:00 | 12:00 | NUM | NumForm=Digit NumType=Card | 5 had | obl |
| 9 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 12 shouts | cc |
| 10 | at | at | ADP | _ | 11 3:30 | case |
| 11 | 3:30 | 3:30 | NUM | NumForm=Digit NumType=Card | 12 shouts | obl |
| 12 | shouts | shout | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 5 had | conj |
| 13 | « | « | PUNCT | _ | 17 eaten | punct |
| 14 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 17 eaten | nsubj |
| 15 | have | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 17 eaten | aux |
| 16 | n't | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 17 eaten | advmod |
| 17 | eaten | eat | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 12 shouts | ccomp |
| 18 | in | in | ADP | _ | 17 eaten | compound:prt |
| 19 | like | like | ADP | _ | 22 years | case |
| 20 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 21 hundred | det |
| 21 | hundred | hundred | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | 22 years | nummod |
| 22 | years | year | NOUN | Number=Plur | 17 eaten | obl |
| 23 | » | » | PUNCT | _ | 17 eaten | punct |
| 24 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 5 had | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | have | past | ★ ★ Leo | lunch | 12:00 | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent lunch=Patient | |||
| 2 | shout speech: express | present | ★ ★ Leo not said here | 3:30 | vn manner_speaking-37.3 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | ||||
| 3 | not eat in in a quote | present · perfect | ★ ★ Leo = ★ | year | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=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.
Sentence 2: How long has it really been since he ate?
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | How | how | ADV | PronType=Int | 2 long | advmod |
| 2 | long | long | ADV | Degree=Pos | 3 has | advmod |
| 3 | has | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 4 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 9 ate | nsubj |
| 5 | really | really | ADV | _ | 9 ate | advmod |
| 6 | been | be | AUX | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 9 ate | cop |
| 7 | since | since | SCONJ | _ | 9 ate | mark |
| 8 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 9 ate | nsubj |
| 9 | ate | eat | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 3 has | parataxis |
| 10 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 3 has | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | have | present | long property | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 2 | is | participle | lunch | eat property | tree rules |
The options
Option 1 · ← Mova's choice
Four and a half hours
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Four | four | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | root | root |
| 2 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 5 hours | cc |
| 3 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 4 half | det |
| 4 | half | half | NOUN | Number=Sing NumForm=Word NumType=Frac | 5 hours | compound |
| 5 | hours | hour | NOUN | Number=Plur | 1 Four | conj |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 2
Two and a half hours
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Two | two | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | root | root |
| 2 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 5 hours | cc |
| 3 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 4 half | det |
| 4 | half | half | NOUN | Number=Sing NumForm=Word NumType=Frac | 5 hours | compound |
| 5 | hours | hour | NOUN | Number=Plur | 1 Two | conj |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 3
A hundred years, just as he says
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 years | det |
| 2 | hundred | hundred | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | 3 years | nummod |
| 3 | years | year | NOUN | Number=Plur | 8 says | nsubj |
| 4 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 3 years | punct |
| 5 | just | just | ADV | _ | 8 says | advmod |
| 6 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 8 says | mark |
| 7 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 8 says | nsubj |
| 8 | says | say | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | say speech: assert | present | a hundred years | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
Option 4 · ✓ the right answer
Three and a half hours
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Three | three | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | root | root |
| 2 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 5 hours | cc |
| 3 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 4 half | det |
| 4 | half | half | NOUN | Number=Sing NumForm=Word NumType=Frac | 5 hours | compound |
| 5 | hours | hour | NOUN | Number=Plur | 1 Three | conj |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
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/language/44-starving-a-million-times-and-a-ton-everyday-hyperbole/t10/