Test 8 · ★★★ · Thinking like a geographer: rivers, mountains and deserts

Why does the Mississippi flow south to the Gulf of Mexico and not north?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 1 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Mississippi · What happens: flow

This is test 8 · ★★★ of lesson 50 «Thinking like a geographer: rivers, mountains and deserts» of the world 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	5 flow	advmod
2	does	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 flow	aux
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 Mississippi	det
4	Mississippi	Mississippi	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 flow	nsubj
5	flow	flow	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	south	south	ADV	_	5 flow	advmod
7	to	to	ADP	_	9 Gulf	case
8	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 Gulf	det
9	Gulf	Gulf	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 flow	obl
10	of	of	ADP	_	11 Mexico	case
11	Mexico	Mexico	PROPN	Number=Sing	9 Gulf	nmod
12	and	and	CCONJ	_	14 north	cc
13	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	14 north	advmod
14	north	north	ADV	_	9 Gulf	conj
15	?	?	PUNCT	_	5 flow	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	flow	present · do-support	the Mississippi					to the Gulf of Mexico; south property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=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.

The options

Option 1 · ✓ the right answer

The land slopes down towards the Gulf of Mexico

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 land	det
2	land	land	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 slopes	nsubj
3	slopes	slope	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	down	down	ADP	_	3 slopes	compound:prt
5	towards	towards	ADP	_	7 Gulf	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 Gulf	det
7	Gulf	Gulf	PROPN	Number=Sing	3 slopes	obl
8	of	of	ADP	_	9 Mexico	case
9	Mexico	Mexico	PROPN	Number=Sing	7 Gulf	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	slope down	present	the land					towards the Gulf of Mexico	vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 2

The Gulf pulls water towards it with its salt

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 Gulf	det
2	Gulf	gulf	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 pulls	nsubj
3	pulls	pull	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 pulls	obj
5	towards	towards	ADP	_	6 it	case
6	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 pulls	obl
7	with	with	ADP	_	9 salt	case
8	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	9 salt	nmod:poss
9	salt	salt	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 pulls	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	pull	present	the Gulf	water		water		with water's salt	vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent water=Theme towards it=Destination

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice

Rivers in America must flow south by law of nature

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Rivers	river	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 flow	nsubj
2	in	in	ADP	_	3 America	case
3	America	America	PROPN	Number=Sing	1 Rivers	nmod
4	must	must	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 flow	aux
5	flow	flow	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
6	south	south	ADV	_	5 flow	advmod
7	by	by	ADP	_	8 law	case
8	law	law	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 flow	obl
9	of	of	ADP	_	10 nature	case
10	nature	nature	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 law	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	flow	must	Rivers in America					by law of nature; south property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme by law=Location

Option 4

The north wind pushes the water south

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 wind	det
2	north	north	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 wind	compound
3	wind	wind	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 pushes	nsubj
4	pushes	push	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 water	det
6	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 pushes	obj
7	south	south	ADV	_	4 pushes	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	push	present	the north wind	the water				south property	vn carry-11.4-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent water=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/world/50-why-the-earth-is-so/t8/