--- title: A slippery slope says one small step will lead to disaster without g… — The politician's either-or and the straw man · tree and pragmatics description: A slippery slope says one small step will lead to disaster without giving a reason for each step; many changes can be stopped or reversed. Who acts: slippery slope, one small step. A sentence of the lesson «The politician's either-or and the straw man» of the world course of Mova's primary school wi --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man/17/) [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/) / [World](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/) / [The politician's either-or and the str…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man/) / 17 # The politician's either-or and the straw man, sentence 17 A slippery slope says one small step will lead to disaster without giving a reason for each step; many changes can be stopped or reversed. **Who acts:** slippery slope, one small step · **What happens:** say, lead, give, stop, reverse · **To what, where:** reason, many changes · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the lesson «The politician's either-or and the straw man» of the world 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 (slippery slope, one small step), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:world:178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man.lesson:17 # text = A slippery slope says one small step will lead to disaster without giving a reason for each step; many changes can be stopped or reversed. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = world # lesson = 178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man.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): R5-strong ×1 1 A a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 3 det _ _ 2 slippery slippery ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 3 amod _ _ 3 slope slope NOUN NN Number=Sing 4 nsubj _ _ 4 says say VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 5 one one NUM CD NumForm=Word|NumType=Card 7 nummod _ _ 6 small small ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 7 amod _ _ 7 step step NOUN NN Number=Sing 9 nsubj _ _ 8 will will AUX MD VerbForm=Fin 9 aux _ _ 9 lead lead VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 4 ccomp _ _ 10 to to ADP IN _ 11 case _ _ 11 disaster disaster NOUN NN Number=Sing 9 obl _ _ 12 without without SCONJ IN _ 13 mark _ _ 13 giving give VERB VBG Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part 9 advcl _ _ 14 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 15 det _ _ 15 reason reason NOUN NN Number=Sing 13 obj _ _ 16 for for ADP IN _ 18 case _ _ 17 each each DET DT PronType=Tot 18 det _ _ 18 step step NOUN NN Number=Sing 15 nmod _ Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=13:obl 19 ; ; PUNCT : _ 24 punct _ _ 20 many many ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 21 amod _ _ 21 changes change NOUN NNS Number=Plur 24 nsubj:pass _ _ 22 can can AUX MD VerbForm=Fin 24 aux _ _ 23 be be AUX VB VerbForm=Inf 24 aux:pass _ _ 24 stopped stop VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 9 parataxis _ _ 25 or or CCONJ CC _ 26 cc _ _ 26 reversed reverse VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 24 conj _ _ 27 . . PUNCT . _ 4 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | a slippery slope | | | | | | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | | 2 | **lead** | future | one small step | | | | | to disaster | vn result-27.2 «NP V PP»: agent=Precondition to disaster=Patient | | 3 | **give** | gerund | one small step *not said here* | a reason | | | | for each step | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP PP.asset»: agent=Agent reason=Theme for step=Asset | | 4 | **stop** | can · passive | | many changes | | | | | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: subject=Eventuality | | 5 | **reverse** | participle | | | | | | | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient | 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:world:178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man.lesson:17`. **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): R5-strong ×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: [The politician's either-or and the str…, 16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man/16/) - next →: ["It's natural so it's healthy" and the…, 0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/179-its-natural-so-its-healthy-and-the-miracle-cure/0/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/178-the-politicians-either-or-and-the-straw-man/)