Exam question 2 · Grief: anger, guilt and laughing at the wrong moment

Identify the principal reason for which a child who was absent at the moment of a relative's death bears no fault for that death.

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you, child · What happens: identify, be · To what, where: principal reason

This is exam question 2 of lesson 67 «Grief: anger, guilt and laughing at the wrong moment» of the religion ethics course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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	Identify	identify	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 reason	det
3	principal	principal	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 reason	amod
4	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Identify	obj
5	for	for	ADP	_	6 which	case
6	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	8 child	obl
7	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	8 child	det
8	child	child	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 reason	conj
9	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	11 absent	nsubj
10	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	11 absent	cop
11	absent	absent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 child	acl:relcl
12	at	at	ADP	_	14 moment	case
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	14 moment	det
14	moment	moment	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 absent	obl
15	of	of	ADP	_	20 bears	case
16	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	17 relative	det
17	relative	relative	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 bears	nmod:poss
18	's	's	PART	_	17 relative	case
19	death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 bears	compound
20	bears	bear	NOUN	Number=Plur	14 moment	nmod
21	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	22 fault	det
22	fault	fault	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 bears	conj
23	for	for	ADP	_	25 death	case
24	that	that	DET	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	25 death	det
25	death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	22 fault	nmod
26	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Identify	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	identify	imperative	you not said here	the principal reason and a child					vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent reason=Theme
2	is	past	a child				moment	absent 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

The child was absent for a sufficiently long period of time

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 child	det
2	child	child	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 absent	nsubj
3	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 absent	cop
4	absent	absent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	for	for	ADP	_	9 period	case
6	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	9 period	det
7	sufficiently	sufficiently	ADV	_	8 long	advmod
8	long	long	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 period	amod
9	period	period	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 absent	obl
10	of	of	ADP	_	11 time	case
11	time	time	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 period	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the child					for a long period of time; absent property	tree rules

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

The relative had expressly forbidden the child's attendance at the bedside

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 relative	det
2	relative	relative	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 forbidden	nsubj:pass
3	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 forbidden	aux
4	expressly	expressly	ADV	_	5 forbidden	advmod
5	forbidden	forbid	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 child	det
7	child	child	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 attendance	nmod:poss
8	's	's	PART	_	7 child	case
9	attendance	attendance	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 forbidden	obj
10	at	at	ADP	_	12 bedside	case
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 bedside	det
12	bedside	bedside	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 forbidden	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	forbid	past · perfect · passive		the relative		the bedside		expressly property	tree rules
2	attend		the child						nom attendance «act transitive»: poss=agent

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Death frequently occurs unexpectedly, and absence does not occasion it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 occurs	nsubj
2	frequently	frequently	ADV	_	3 occurs	advmod
3	occurs	occur	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	unexpectedly	unexpectedly	ADV	_	3 occurs	advmod
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 occasion	punct
6	and	and	CCONJ	_	10 occasion	cc
7	absence	absence	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 occasion	nsubj
8	does	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	10 occasion	aux
9	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	10 occasion	advmod
10	occasion	occasion	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 occurs	conj
11	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	10 occasion	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	occur	present	Death					frequently, unexpectedly property	vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	not occasion	present · do-support	absence	Death					tree rules

Option 4

Only adults are capable of causing such events to occur

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Only	only	ADV	_	4 capable	advmod
2	adults	adult	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 capable	nsubj
3	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 capable	cop
4	capable	capable	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	of	of	SCONJ	_	6 causing	mark
6	causing	cause	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	4 capable	advcl
7	such	such	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 events	amod
8	events	event	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 causing	obj
9	to	to	PART	_	10 occur	mark
10	occur	occur	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 causing	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	is	present	adults		capable property	tree rules
2	cause	gerund	adults not said here	such events		tree rules
3	occur	to-infinitive	such events not said here			vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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/67-grief-anger-guilt-and-laughing-at-the-wrong-moment/e2/