Surprising brains: tool-using fish, counting bees, laughing rats and clever pigs

Tests: 5 of 11 right · Exam: 2 of 4 right · Kind: ★★ · Understood: 11 of 15 · Run: 2026-10-18, commit f3c23ea72

Lesson 388 of the biology course of Mova's primary school, as Mova's small model took its tests: it had read this lesson and the ones before it and learned from their exercises. Each test shows the options in the order the student saw them, its choice, the right answer, the score of every option and why it chose. The lesson itself, sentence by sentence with trees and pragmatics: the lesson in the corpora.

Every question of this lesson and each of its options parsed by Mova, with trees and pragmatics: the lesson's questions in the corpora.

Test 1 · ★★ · wrong ✗

In Finding Nemo, Dory the fish forgets everything in seconds. What does science say about some fish?

1. Fish can talk like Dory — score 0
2. Fish have no brains at all — score 0
3. Some fish use tools, and some seemed to notice themselves in a mirror — ✓ the right answer · score 0
4. Every fish forgets everything in three seconds, just like Dory in the film — ← Mova's choice · score 11

Why: It took the question to ask what it is done to. It chose option 4 with score 11, against 0 for the next best. Its support: lesson 152, line 4: «Fish need memory just like other animals, to find food, avoid danger and know their way around, and a fish that forgot everything every three seconds would not…», reached through the remembered sentence the question matched. What matched: the same action «forget» (+6); the same doer «fish» (+2); it fills the role the question asks for (+2); the same property (+1). The right option, 3, scored 0. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 2 · ★★ · wrong ✗

Count them: 3 jumping spiders. How many eyes in all?

1. Six — ← Mova's choice · no support
2. Thirty-two — no support
3. Twenty-four — ✓ the right answer · no support
4. Eighteen — no support

Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 3 · ★★ · wrong ✗

Count them: a bee has 6 legs and 2 feelers. How many legs and feelers on 4 bees?

1. 16 legs and 8 feelers — ← Mova's choice · no support
2. 24 legs and 8 feelers — ✓ the right answer · no support
3. 24 legs and 24 feelers — no support
4. 6 legs and 2 feelers — no support

Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 4 · ★★ · right ✓

«bees are tiny, they can't count nothing» What is right?

1. Only queen bees can count, and they count all the eggs in the hive — score 2
2. In tests they learned to count landmarks up to about four — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 6
3. Bees can count to a million — no support
4. Bees have no brains — no support

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 2 with score 6, against 2 for the next best. Its support: lesson 388, line 1: «A honeybee's brain is about the size of a grain of sand, yet in tests bees learned to count landmarks up to about four to find sugar water. Small brains can do…», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same circumstance (+3); the same thing acted on «landmarks» (+2); the same action «count up» (+1). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 5 · ★★ · right ✓

In Ratatouille Remy the rat cooks in Paris. A friend says real rats have no feelings at all. What is right?

1. Rats can cook like Remy if a person trains them — score 1
2. Rats laugh so loudly that people have to cover their ears — score 1
3. Tickled rats chirp like laughing and come back for more — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 7
4. Rats feel nothing ever — score 1

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 3 with score 7, against 1 for the next best. Its support: lesson 388, line 3: «Tickled rats make very high chirps, too high for us to hear without special equipment, and come back for more. Scientists think these chirps are a kind of laug…», reached through the same lesson line as the sentence the question matched. What matched: the same action «come back» (+4); the same circumstance (+3). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 6 · ★★ · wrong ✗

What would happen if you tickled a rat and listened with your ears only?

1. You would probably hear nothing; the chirps are too high — ✓ the right answer · no support
2. You would hear loud laughter from the next room — no support
3. It would bark like a little dog — ← Mova's choice · score 2
4. It would sing a song — no support

Why: It took the question to ask what happens next. It chose option 3 with score 2, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 382, line 6: «The twelve zodiac animals are rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog and pig; eleven are real and one, the dragon, is not.», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same circumstance (+2). The right option, 1, found no support in what it remembers. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 7 · ★★ · wrong ✗

«pigs are dumb, just mud and food» What is right?

1. Pigs used a mirror to find food and played a joystick game — ✓ the right answer · score 3
2. Pigs can read books and simple signs on the farm gate — no support
3. Pigs cannot learn anything at all — ← Mova's choice · score 4
4. Pigs are blind — no support

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 3 with score 4, against 3 for the next best. Its support: lesson 353, line 11: «Dogs sweat only a little, through their paws, and cool down mainly by panting; pigs barely sweat at all, so they roll in mud to keep cool.», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same place «all» (+4). The right option, 1, scored 3. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 8 · ★★ · right ✓

«big brain = clever, end of. whale beats everyone» What is the fair view?

1. Small brains do nothing — no support
2. How well brain cells are packed and connected matters, not just size — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 3
3. Size is the only thing that counts — no support
4. The biggest brain is always the cleverest, so the whale really does win — no support

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 2 with score 3, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 388, line 15: «Crows and parrots pack many nerve cells into small brains, so they are cleverer than their brain size suggests.», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same thing acted on «many nerve cells» (+2); the same action «pack» (+1). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 9 · ★★ · right ✓

«bumblebee rolling a ball, prob just a mistake» What made scientists call it play?

1. They did it again and again with no reward — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 3
2. They were paid with sugar water each time they rolled one — no support
3. They were forced to — no support
4. It happened only once — no support

Why: It took the question to ask who or what does it. It chose option 1 with score 3, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 388, line 10: «Bumblebees were reported to roll little balls again and again with no sugar reward, one of the first reports of play in an insect.», reached through the remembered sentence the question matched. What matched: the same circumstance (+3). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 10 · ★★ · wrong ✗

«a fish smashing a clam isn't using a tool, it's just being strong» What is the best answer?

1. It uses the rock as an anvil to do what it could not alone — ✓ the right answer · score 1
2. The clam breaks itself — score 2
3. Fish cannot hold anything — score -2
4. Yes, it only uses its strength, so it is not a tool at all — ← Mova's choice · score 5

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 4 with score 5, against 2 for the next best. Its support: lesson 90, line 3: «Finding Nemo got some things right and some wrong: clownfish do live safely in stinging anemones, but in a real clownfish family, when the mother dies, the fat…», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same place «all» (+4); the same light verb (be, have, do, get, go) (+1). The right option, 1, scored 1. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Test 11 · ★★ · right ✓

«my dog reads my moods, my squirrel remembers nuts, which one's smarter, ugh just tell me» What is the best answer?

1. The squirrel, because its brain is bigger — score 3
2. The dog, dogs always win — score -1
3. Each is clever in the way its own life needs — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 5
4. Neither has any cleverness — no support

Why: It took the question to ask a circumstance (with what, when, how). It chose option 3 with score 5, against 3 for the next best. Its support: lesson 388, line 16: «Different animals are clever in different ways: a squirrel remembers hundreds of buried nuts, a bee its flower map, a dog our moods.», reached through the same lesson line as the sentence the question matched. What matched: the same place «different ways» (+3); the same property (+3); the same light verb (be, have, do, get, go) (+1). Against it: a different doer (counts against) (-2). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Exam question 1 · formal language · right ✓

Identify the principal manner in which the tuskfish employs an object as an implement.

1. It shapes stones with its teeth — no support
2. It grasps a stick with its fins and prises the shell apart — no support
3. It employs a shell as a hat — score -1
4. It strikes a clam against a rock, which serves as an anvil — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 5

Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 4 with score 5, against -1 for the next best. Its support: lesson 388, line 7: «The tuskfish carries a clam in its mouth and smashes it on a rock, using the rock as an anvil.», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same circumstance (+3); the same thing acted on «rock» (+2). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Exam question 2 · formal language · wrong ✗

Ascertain the approximate number to which honeybees have been shown to count landmarks under experimental conditions.

1. Forty — ← Mova's choice · no support
2. Four — ✓ the right answer · no support
3. Only one — no support
4. One hundred — no support

Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Exam question 3 · formal language · wrong ✗

Select the response consistent with the established facts concerning the vocalisations of rats when tickled.

1. They remain entirely silent — ← Mova's choice · no support
2. They emit chirps of a pitch above the range of unaided human hearing — ✓ the right answer · no support
3. They produce sounds identical to human speech — no support
4. They produce a loud bark audible at a great distance across the laboratory — no support

Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

Exam question 4 · formal language · right ✓

Which of the following statements most accurately characterises the present scientific view of animal intelligence?

1. Each species is clever in respects suited to its own manner of life — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 3
2. Insects are devoid of any capacity to learn — no support
3. Intelligence is determined solely by the size of the brain — no support
4. All species may be ranked upon a single ladder with humans uppermost — no support

Why: It took the question to ask who or what does it. It chose option 1 with score 3, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 349, line 12: «In autumn farmers plough and sow winter wheat or barley, and gulls and rooks follow the plough to snatch worms and grubs.», reached through the same lesson line as the sentence the question matched. What matched: it fills the role the question asks for (+2); the same doer «farmers» (+1). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/388-surprising-brains-tool-using-fish-counting-bees-laughing-rats-and-clever-pigs/