Rolling Thunder

… the suction of the reactor coolant pumps.

"pumps" comes up as a NounVerb. It is possible, but unlikely, that "pumps" is being used as a verb, but unlikely is not good enough. Another example

Migration to other islands is possible, for the seed of the coconut palm floats.

Here the word "floats" is a verb, and we know about a "coconut palm", but know nothing about a "coconut palm float". A seed is something (a physical object) that can float, and the meaning is germane to the prior clause. We can have a noun in this position

Migration to other islands is possible, for the larger seed pods.

In the initial example, we know about "reactor", we know about "reactor coolant", and we know about "reactor coolant pump" – a pump for pumping the coolant used in the reactor, and we know that pumps have suction (inlet), so unless there is a special claim for it to be a verb, or we know there is only one pump and we can find a suitable subject, "pumps" must be a noun.

Turning "pumps" into a NounVerb and then using knowledge of verb location in the sentence to determine which it is, is throwing away useful information (and not at all how people read sentences – we seem to roll through them, understanding as we go, sometimes needing to backtrack).

He monitored the pressure at the steam generator outlet and the suction of the reactor coolant pumps.

The possible two clauses are most unlikely – past tense and present tense

the suction of the reactor coolant pumps.

Outlet is similar to suction, suction is a component of pump, and suction doesn’t pump. There are usually multiple pathways to determine which alternative is valid – using only the location of other verbs is a weak way.

If we set up a little model, it would look like

For a noun, we look at the relations between

· Reactor coolant and pumps – a pump can pump coolant, so high probability.

· Suction and pumps – suction is a component of pump, connected through "of" preposition, expected if component.

· "outlet" and "suction" are similar, indicating grouping across conjunction, rather than clausal conjunction.

For a verb, we look at the possible parallel clause, and the possible subject(s) of the verb

· Similarity between "monitored" and "pumps" – different tense, little similarity

· Suction doesn’t act as subject of ToPump relation.

· No similarity of subject between "he" and "suction".

We have a problem when combining probabilities, although this can be reduced by gathering more evidence – we have only looked at "coolant pump", while "reactor coolant pump’ would furnish more, and "steam generator" is located close to "reactor coolant pump" (and listed together in a previous sentence), so we can be sure of the same context.

The approach may seem heavy-handed when determining the alternatives for the word "pumps", but we need a method with high reliability.

Design Notes