--- title: Most fossils form when a living thing is buried quickly, and mineral… — Fossils: how we know about life long ago · tree and pragmatics description: Most fossils form when a living thing is buried quickly, and minerals carried by water fill or replace the remains; only a tiny fraction of living things ever become fossils, because most remains are scattered, eaten or rot first, and soft animals like jellyfish, with no hard parts, almost never do. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/74-fossils-life-long-ago/6/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / [Fossils: how we know about life long ago](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/74-fossils-life-long-ago/) / 6 # Fossils: how we know about life long ago, sentence 6 Most fossils form when a living thing is buried quickly, and minerals carried by water fill or replace the remains; only a tiny fraction of living things ever become fossils, because most remains are scattered, eaten or rot first, and soft animals like jellyfish, with no hard parts, almost never do. **Who acts:** Most fossils, minerals, tiny fraction, soft animals · **What happens:** form, bury, carry, fill, replace, become · **To what, where:** living thing, minerals, remains, fossils, most remains This is a sentence of the lesson «Fossils: how we know about life long ago» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Most fossils, minerals, tiny fraction, soft animals), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:biology:074-fossils-life-long-ago.lesson:6 # text = Most fossils form when a living thing is buried quickly, and minerals carried by water fill or replace the remains; only a tiny fraction of living things ever become fossils, because most remains are scattered, eaten or rot first, and soft animals like jellyfish, with no hard parts, almost never do. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = biology # lesson = 074-fossils-life-long-ago.lesson # annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R2-punct-next ×2, R7-rel-agree ×1 1 Most most ADJ JJS Degree=Sup 2 amod _ _ 2 fossils fossil NOUN NNS Number=Plur 3 nsubj _ _ 3 form form VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 4 when when SCONJ WRB _ 9 mark _ _ 5 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 7 det _ _ 6 living living NOUN NN Number=Sing 7 compound _ _ 7 thing thing NOUN NN Number=Sing 9 nsubj:pass _ _ 8 is be AUX VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 9 aux:pass _ _ 9 buried bury VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 3 advcl _ _ 10 quickly quickly ADV RB _ 9 advmod _ _ 11 , , PUNCT , _ 17 punct _ Agree=R2-punct-next|Haiku=3:punct 12 and and CCONJ CC _ 17 cc _ _ 13 minerals mineral NOUN NNS Number=Plur 17 nsubj _ _ 14 carried carry VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 13 acl _ _ 15 by by ADP IN _ 16 case _ _ 16 water water NOUN NN Number=Sing 14 obl _ _ 17 fill fill VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 3 conj _ _ 18 or or CCONJ CC _ 19 cc _ _ 19 replace replace VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 17 conj _ _ 20 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 21 det _ _ 21 remains remains NOUN NNS Number=Ptan 19 obj _ _ 22 ; ; PUNCT : _ 3 punct _ _ 23 only only ADV RB _ 26 advmod _ _ 24 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 26 det _ _ 25 tiny tiny ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 26 amod _ _ 26 fraction fraction NOUN NN Number=Sing 31 nsubj _ _ 27 of of ADP IN _ 29 case _ _ 28 living living ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 29 amod _ _ 29 things thing NOUN NNS Number=Plur 26 nmod _ _ 30 ever ever ADV RB PronType=Ind 31 advmod _ _ 31 become become VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 3 parataxis _ _ 32 fossils fossil NOUN NNS Number=Plur 31 xcomp _ Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=31:obj 33 , , PUNCT , _ 31 punct _ _ 34 because because SCONJ IN _ 38 mark _ _ 35 most most ADJ JJS Degree=Sup 36 amod _ _ 36 remains remains NOUN NNS Number=Ptan 38 nsubj:pass _ _ 37 are be AUX VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 38 aux:pass _ _ 38 scattered scatter VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 31 advcl _ _ 39 , , PUNCT , _ 40 punct _ _ 40 eaten eat VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part 38 conj _ _ 41 or or CCONJ CC _ 42 cc _ _ 42 rot rot VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 40 conj _ _ 43 first first ADV RB NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord 42 advmod _ _ 44 , , PUNCT , _ 58 punct _ Agree=R2-punct-next|Haiku=38:punct 45 and and CCONJ CC _ 58 cc _ _ 46 soft soft ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 47 amod _ _ 47 animals animal NOUN NNS Number=Plur 58 nsubj _ _ 48 like like ADP IN _ 49 case _ _ 49 jellyfish jellyfish NOUN NNS Number=Plur 47 nmod _ _ 50 , , PUNCT , _ 54 punct _ _ 51 with with ADP IN _ 54 case _ _ 52 no no DET DT PronType=Neg 54 det _ _ 53 hard hard ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 54 amod _ _ 54 parts part NOUN NNS Number=Plur 49 nmod _ _ 55 , , PUNCT , _ 58 punct _ _ 56 almost almost ADV RB _ 58 advmod _ _ 57 never never ADV RB PronType=Neg 58 advmod _ _ 58 do do VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 38 conj _ _ 59 . . PUNCT . _ 3 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **form** | present | Most fossils | | | | | | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | | 2 | **bury** | present · passive | | a living thing | | | | quickly *property* | vn put-9.1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme | | 3 | **carry** | participle | | minerals *not said here* | | | | by water | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | | 4 | **fill** | present | minerals | | | | | | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient | | 5 | **replace** | present | minerals *not said here* | the remains | | | | | vn substitute-13.6.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme remains=Co-Theme | | 6 | **become** | present | a tiny fraction of living things | fossils | | | ever | | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient | | 7 | **scatter** | present · passive | | most remains | | | | | vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V NP.theme»: subject=Theme | | 8 | **eat** | participle | | | | | | | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | | 9 | **rot** | infinitive | | | | | | first *property* | vn entity\_specific\_cos-45.5 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient | | 10 | **not** **do** | present | soft animals like jellyfish with no hard parts | | | | | almost *property* | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | 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. **Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:biology:074-fossils-life-long-ago.lesson:6`. **The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R2-punct-next ×2, R7-rel-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence. See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/). - ← previous: [Fossils: how we know about life long ago, 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/74-fossils-life-long-ago/4/) - next →: [Fossils: how we know about life long ago, 7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/74-fossils-life-long-ago/7/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/74-fossils-life-long-ago/)