Test 3 · ★ · Why living things die, and the circle of life in nature

What would happen if nothing in nature ever rotted?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 1 · wrong ✗ · What happens: happen, rot · To what, where: nothing

This is test 3 · ★ of lesson 53 «Why living things die, and the circle of life in nature» of the religion ethics 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	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	_	9 rotted	mark
5	nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	9 rotted	nsubj:pass
6	in	in	ADP	_	7 nature	case
7	nature	nature	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 nothing	nmod
8	ever	ever	ADV	PronType=Ind	9 rotted	advmod
9	rotted	rot	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 happen	advcl
10	?	?	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	rot a condition, not said to happen	participle · passive		nothing			ever		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 · ✓ the right answer

Dead plants and animals would pile up and the soil would not be fed

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 plants	amod
2	plants	plant	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 pile	nsubj
3	and	and	CCONJ	_	4 animals	cc
4	animals	animal	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 plants	conj
5	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	6 pile	aux
6	pile	pile	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
7	up	up	ADP	_	6 pile	compound:prt
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	14 fed	cc
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 soil	det
10	soil	soil	NOUN	Number=Sing	14 fed	nsubj:pass
11	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	14 fed	aux
12	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	14 fed	advmod
13	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	14 fed	aux:pass
14	fed	feed	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	6 pile	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	pile up	would	Dead plants and animals						vn spray-9.7-1-1 «NP V PP.destination»: agent=Theme
2	not feed	would · passive		the soil					vn feeding-39.7 «NP V NP»: subject=Recipient

Option 2

Animals would never need to eat again

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Animals	animal	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 need	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	4 need	aux
3	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	4 need	advmod
4	need	need	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	6 eat	mark
6	eat	eat	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 need	xcomp
7	again	again	ADV	_	6 eat	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not need	would	Animals						vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme
2	eat not said to happen	to-infinitive	Animals not said here				again		vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice

Plants would grow faster without soil

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Plants	plant	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 grow	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 grow	aux
3	grow	grow	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	faster	fast	ADV	Degree=Cmp	3 grow	advmod
5	without	without	ADP	_	6 soil	case
6	soil	soil	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 grow	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	grow	would	Plants					without soil; fast property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 4

Nothing would change at all

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	3 change	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 change	aux
3	change	change	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	at	at	ADP	_	5 all	case
5	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	3 change	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	change	would	Nothing			all			vn dress-41.1.1-1-1 «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/religion-ethics/53-why-living-things-die-and-the-circle-of-life/t3/