Test 8 · Memes, clips and jokes about politicians
A comedy show copies the news with a straight face. What would happen if someone thought it was real news?
Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: comedy show, someone, show · What happens: copy, happen, think, be · To what, where: news, real news · Speech: someone speaks here
This is test 8 of lesson 13 «Memes, clips and jokes about politicians» of the politics 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: A comedy show copies the news with a straight face.
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 show | det |
| 2 | comedy | comedy | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 show | compound |
| 3 | show | show | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 copies | nsubj |
| 4 | copies | copy | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 news | det |
| 6 | news | news | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 copies | obj |
| 7 | with | with | ADP | _ | 10 face | case |
| 8 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 10 face | det |
| 9 | straight | straight | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 10 face | amod |
| 10 | face | face | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 copies | obl |
| 11 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 copies | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | copy | present | a comedy show | the news | with a straight face | vn scribble-25.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent news=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.
Sentence 2: What would happen if someone thought it was real news?
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What | what | PRON | PronType=Int | 3 happen | nsubj |
| 2 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 3 happen | aux |
| 3 | happen | happen | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 4 | if | if | SCONJ | _ | 6 thought | mark |
| 5 | someone | someone | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Ind | 6 thought | nsubj |
| 6 | thought | think | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 3 happen | advcl |
| 7 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 10 news | nsubj |
| 8 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 10 news | cop |
| 9 | real | real | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 10 news | amod |
| 10 | news | news | NOUN | Number=Sing | 6 thought | ccomp |
| 11 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 3 happen | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | happen | would | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||||
| 2 | think speech: other a condition, not said to happen | past | someone | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 3 | is a | past | show | real news | tree rules |
The options
Option 1 · ← Mova's choice
They would learn every fact correctly
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | They | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 3 learn | nsubj |
| 2 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 3 learn | aux |
| 3 | learn | learn | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 4 | every | every | DET | PronType=Tot | 5 fact | det |
| 5 | fact | fact | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 learn | obj |
| 6 | correctly | correctly | ADV | _ | 3 learn | advmod |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | learn | would | They | every fact | correctly property | vn learn-14-2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fact=Topic |
Option 2
The show would become real news
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 2 show | det |
| 2 | show | show | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 become | nsubj |
| 3 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 4 become | aux |
| 4 | become | become | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 5 | real | real | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 6 news | amod |
| 6 | news | news | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 become | xcomp |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | become | would | the show | real news | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |
Option 3
Nothing, satire is always true
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nothing | nothing | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Neg | 3 satire | compound |
| 2 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 1 Nothing | punct |
| 3 | satire | satire | NOUN | Number=Sing | 6 true | nsubj |
| 4 | is | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 6 true | cop |
| 5 | always | always | ADV | PronType=Tot | 6 true | advmod |
| 6 | true | true | ADJ | Degree=Pos | root | root |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | is | present | Nothing satire | always, true property | tree rules |
Option 4 · ✓ the right answer
They could believe jokes as if they were facts
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | They | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 3 believe | nsubj |
| 2 | could | could | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 3 believe | aux |
| 3 | believe | believe | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 4 | jokes | joke | NOUN | Number=Plur | 3 believe | obj |
| 5 | as | as | ADP | _ | 9 facts | case |
| 6 | if | if | SCONJ | _ | 9 facts | mark |
| 7 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 9 facts | nsubj |
| 8 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 9 facts | cop |
| 9 | facts | fact | NOUN | Number=Plur | 3 believe | obl |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | believe | could | They | jokes | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer joke=Stimulus | ||||
| 2 | is a condition, not said to happen | past | jokes = joke | as facts | tree rules |
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/politics/13-memes-clips-and-jokes-about-politicians/t8/