Several weeks ago I asked the question: Is the product of a cloned cow, cloned milk? Or is she just a factory, and the clone puts out real milk? As I looked further at the situation, it only became more confusing - what with cloned animals mixing-and-mating with old-fashioned ones - but my focus today is about questions.

You see, I scour everywhere for clues on how our world is changing. There's the constant flood of news from every corner of the planet, the surprises of everyday life, obscure reports from governments and think tanks, scientific abstracts and even airline magazines.

There are times when three insights hit me within three minutes, but there are other times when a larger question begins to take shape.

Such was the case with the question about the cloned cow. I'd been hearing about Sausalito Savings & Clone pumping out domestic house cats and soon - your favorite puppy - and they are trying to clone endangered species to save them from extinction, and now there were four new cows, each bred from a single Elsie. How can you really know, where the half-n-half you dollop in your morning coffee comes from? How many of us have come face to face with the actual dairy cow that produces what you consume? And as we're cloning and mixing and mating, what will happen to all our animals in just a few generations?

Of course, there are other questions which are more specific and don't lead to commentaries. For instance, my cell phone company charges me $1.25 to call Information to get a telephone number.

The question that leaps to mind is: Why is it, with all this technology, that an automated voice can tell me the number and even say they'll connect me "at no additional charge," yet somehow they have no technology to send it to my cell phone? If I want to call ten minutes later, I'd better have written it down, or I will have to call 4-1-1 again, and there goes another $1.25. But if my hands were free, I'd look it up on the Internet for nothing.

I don't mind paying for service. What I mind is being taken. I mind feeling like they've got then hand in my wallet, and they intend to keep it there.

My Mother would swear that I spent from the time I could talk to the time I read, and every other sentence started out: "How come …," but I can't be the only one asking questions. Questions occur to all of us, especially about how life is turning out in a pretty unexpected way.

So I'd love it if you'd email me your questions. That's right, the ones that have been rolling around in your head. What's are your burning questions you want to ask of the universe?

But there's a catch: I'll only read the first 100 words of any question. Write as long a question as you'd like, but mark my words: Start counting at "hello." You have me from "hello," but there's a definite limit, and extra points for really short ones. Email your burning question to questions@technation.com.

Now, I can't promise any answers. We can't expect to be as lucky as Douglas Adams with the "Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything." With the answer being "42," I mean, how lucky can you get?

But I do know that progress is made just by asking the right questions. And yes, I'm looking forward to yours.

I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.

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