Test 10 · ★ · Birds and baby animals

Why do people keep the "don't touch the chick" rule even though the smell reason is wrong?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: people, smell reason · What happens: keep, not touch, be · To what, where: touch rule, chick

This is test 10 · ★ of lesson 10 «Birds and baby animals» of the myths 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 keep	advmod
2	do	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 keep	aux
3	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 keep	nsubj
4	keep	keep	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 rule	det
6	"	"	PUNCT	_	9 touch	punct
7	do	do	AUX	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	9 touch	aux
8	n't	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	9 touch	advmod
9	touch	touch	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	13 rule	compound
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 chick	det
11	chick	chick	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 touch	obj
12	"	"	PUNCT	_	9 touch	punct
13	rule	rule	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 keep	obj
14	even	even	ADV	_	20 wrong	advmod
15	though	though	SCONJ	_	20 wrong	mark
16	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	18 reason	det
17	smell	smell	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 reason	compound
18	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 wrong	nsubj
19	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	20 wrong	cop
20	wrong	wrong	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 keep	advcl
21	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 keep	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	keep	present · do-support	people	the touch rule		vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent rule=Theme
2	not touch in a quote	infinitive · do-support		the chick		vn contiguous_location-47.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme chick=Co-Theme
3	is	present	the smell reason		wrong property	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 · ← Mova's choice

Because chicks really are poisonous

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	5 poisonous	mark
2	chicks	chick	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 poisonous	nsubj
3	really	really	ADV	_	5 poisonous	advmod
4	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 poisonous	cop
5	poisonous	poisonous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	chicks					poisonous property	tree rules

Option 2

Because birds can read fingerprints

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	4 read	mark
2	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 read	nsubj
3	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 read	aux
4	read	read	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	fingerprints	fingerprint	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 read	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	read	can	birds	fingerprints					vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fingerprint=Topic

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Leaving it is still best, because its parents are nearby

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Leaving	leave	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	5 best	csubj
2	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	1 Leaving	obj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 best	cop
4	still	still	ADV	_	5 best	advmod
5	best	good	ADJ	Degree=Sup	root	root
6	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 nearby	punct
7	because	because	SCONJ	_	11 nearby	mark
8	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	9 parents	nmod:poss
9	parents	parent	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 nearby	nsubj
10	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	11 nearby	cop
11	nearby	nearby	ADV	_	5 best	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	when	other	roles by
1	leave	gerund		it			vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme
2	is	present	Leaving		still	good property	tree rules
3	is	present	its parents			nearby property	tree rules

Option 4

Because the law says that a person's smell matters to birds

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Because	because	SCONJ	_	4 says	mark
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 law	det
3	law	law	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 says	nsubj
4	says	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	that	that	SCONJ	_	10 matters	mark
6	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	7 person	det
7	person	person	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 smell	nmod:poss
8	's	's	PART	_	7 person	case
9	smell	smell	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 matters	nsubj
10	matters	matter	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 says	ccomp
11	to	to	ADP	_	12 birds	case
12	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	10 matters	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	other	roles by
1	say speech: assert	present	the law		vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	matter	present	a person's smell	to birds	vn matter-91 «NP V PP.experiencer»: agent=Stimulus to bird=Experiencer
3	smell		a person		nom smell «cognition intransitive»: poss=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/myths/10-birds-and-baby-animals/t10/