---
title: A principle is a general rule used in reasoning, such as "do not har… — How to argue: reasons and evidence · tree and pragmatics
description: A principle is a general rule used in reasoning, such as "do not harm the innocent". Who acts: principle. A sentence of the lesson «How to argue: reasons and evidence» of the religion ethics course of Mova's primary school with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# How to argue: reasons and evidence, sentence 15

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A principle is a general rule used in reasoning, such as "do not harm the innocent".

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**Who acts:** principle · **What happens:** be, use, not harm · **To what, where:** general rule, reasoning, innocent · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of the lesson «How to argue: reasons and evidence» of the religion ethics 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 (principle), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = school:religion-ethics:039-how-to-argue-reasons-and-evidence.lesson:15
# text = A principle is a general rule used in reasoning, such as "do not harm the innocent".
# source = school lesson (ours)
# course = religion-ethics
# lesson = 039-how-to-argue-reasons-and-evidence.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): R6-punct-agree ×1, R8-pos-agree ×1
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	principle	principle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	general	general	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	rule	rule	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
7	used	use	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	6	acl	_	_
8	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	reasoning	reasoning	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
11	such	such	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	advmod	_	_
12	as	as	ADP	IN	_	11	fixed	_	_
13	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	16	punct	_	Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=11:punct
14	do	do	AUX	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=16:aux|HaikuPos=AUX:VBP:Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin
15	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	harm	harm	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	6	parataxis	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	innocent	innocent	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	obj	_	_
19	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	16	punct	_	_
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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No stored speech act for this sentence.

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present | a principle | a general rule |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **use** | participle |  | a general rule *not said here* |  | reasoning |  |  | vn eat-39.1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **not** **harm** *in a quote* | infinitive · do-support |  | the innocent |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus innocent=Experiencer |

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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.

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**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:religion-ethics:039-how-to-argue-reasons-and-evidence.lesson:15`.

**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): R6-punct-agree ×1, R8-pos-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/).

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