Human Beings

The biggest problem with ''Afrocentric'' education to my mind is that only black people seem to be getting it. White people need it just as badly. Otherwise they won't know who they are, either.We are told that everybody should know their own history. That's the whole rationale for introducing ''multicultural'' curriculums in the public schools, as Baltimore has begun to do this year. Eighty percent of the city public school population is African-American. School officials say the new curriculum is needed to correct the omissions, distortions and inaccuracies concerning the contributions of minorities to American and world history.

Has there been a more polarizing figure in professional sports over the past year than Tim Tebow? Whether it was his string of fourth-quarter comebacks, thrilling overtime playoff victory over the Steelers or public displays of his faith, Mr. Tebow generates a wide range of reactions from the public. Mr. Tebow's faith is an integral part of the player, the man and the human being. Today, when media outlets are littered with players' indiscretions and mistakes, it's refreshing to see someone who practices what he preaches.

He was bigger than life. But he was only human.Mickey Mantle should be remembered as the blond-haired, thickly muscled Oklahoman who became one of baseball's all-time greats.He also should be remembered as the gaunt, frail figure whose alcoholism was at least partly responsible for the liver cancer that left him dead at the age of 63.One image cannot endure without the other.To savor Mantle simply as a sports hero is to ignore his life of excess.But to dwell on his shortcomings is to ignore his mythic place in American sports history.

Woe to those who, to the very end, insist on regulating the movement that surpasses them with the narrow mind of the mechanic who changes a tire. Georges Bataille, The Accursed Share Watson, an IBM-designed computer, just defeated two of "Jeopardy's" best players. While this is not the first time a computer beat humans in a game — Deep Blue topped a chess champion several years ago — Watson's victory is striking. Before a national audience, computer intelligence outdid its human creator and adversary in speed and memory.

On January 7, 2004, GREGORY ALLEN ELIZONDO. Friends and fami ly will gather on Sunday, February 8, 6 P.M. at the Peabody Court Hotel to remember this most wonderful of human beings in a Celebration of Life. Inquiries please call (410) 962-7074.

Only one animal has chosen to be our ally and our friend. When that dog decides to bond to us, that's eternal. It's never going to change. ... Human beings have failed dogs constantly. I've never heard of a dog failing a human being." - ROBERT LIVAS, Will County, Ill., circuit judge, as he sentenced a man to 15 months in prison for killing a puppy

The boundary line between human beings and animals has never been altogether clear. Now -- as we read about laboratory mice with human genes and contemplate a future of pig-to-people organ transplants -- the ancient fantasy of a chimera, a being part human and part animal, is fast becoming a scientific reality.The news from the laboratories is spectacular and more than a little science-fictionish. Among the new creatures that have been created is the ''oncomouse,'' which develops human cancers, and other mice that model other human ailments such as Alzheimer's and diabetes.

For the young women who dance in bars and clubs on The Block, Baltimore's adult entertainment district, life is a few days or weeks of cheap thrills, then years of drug addiction, abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, emotional torment and early death. Few newcomers realize the future that awaits them. As The Sun's Jonathan Bor reported last week in an article about the health risks faced by prostitutes, their odds of escaping it are vanishingly small. Mr. Bor's story focused on city public health workers' efforts to help dancers on The Block avoid HIV infection by giving them free condoms and clean needles.

ARLINGTON, Va. -- Trying to tread a fine line between encouraging scientific progress and preventing horrendous abuses of a new technology, a presidential advisory committee agreed yesterday that there should be a moratorium on the cloning of human beings by public or private institutions.The group said efforts to clone a person would not be safe now because they would be too likely to result in malformed fetuses.The 18-member group was charged by President Clinton with making a recommendation on human cloning by the end of the month.

WITH THE country charging into its first war of the 21st century, some of us descended last week into the 19th century. The re-created cargo schooner Amistad docked at a city pier, its story of primitive barbarism unimaginable to modern sensibilities. Humanity's much different now. When we conduct barbarism today, we do it on the grand, sophisticated scale. The original Amistad carried human beings who were considered property. New York's World Trade Center housed human beings who were considered meaningless.

Reggie Prasad wants to stop slot machines from coming anywhere near Arundel Mills mall, but he has never heard of the Maryland Jockey Club, the track owner working toward the same goal. He has never been coached on talking points by the Ford Group, the public relations agency being paid by the corporate suits fighting slots at the mall. He doesn't know superlawyer Alan M. Rifkin or anybody else associated with the jillion-dollar offensive of anti-slots TV ads, news releases and litigation.

Committing yourself for 12 hours to any TV production is a big deal. But before you decide you don't have the time for Ken Burns' new multipart documentary, "The National Parks: America's Best Idea," consider just giving it a 30-minute tryout. Watch the first half-hour tonight on PBS, and I bet you will become hooked on one of the best and most rewarding viewing experiences of the TV year. This is a film with both beauty and brains - it is gorgeous to look at, it will make you think and possibly even stir your soul.

MUMBAI, India - With a bit of pluck, even if was not always heartfelt, a touch of defiance and a dose of the city's famous resilience, Mumbai dusted itself off yesterday from last week's terrorist attack and headed back to work. The trains were reasonably packed, traffic was beginning to resemble its normally chaotic self and shoppers eased back into the stores, even if many still were not buying much. "Sure I'm scared," said Roshan Tengra, a housewife, as she headed into a Bank of India branch a few blocks from the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower hotel where the most protracted militant attack occurred.

For the young women who dance in bars and clubs on The Block, Baltimore's adult entertainment district, life is a few days or weeks of cheap thrills, then years of drug addiction, abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, emotional torment and early death. Few newcomers realize the future that awaits them. As The Sun's Jonathan Bor reported last week in an article about the health risks faced by prostitutes, their odds of escaping it are vanishingly small. Mr. Bor's story focused on city public health workers' efforts to help dancers on The Block avoid HIV infection by giving them free condoms and clean needles.

"My dear, let us hope that it isn't true!" the wife of the bishop of Worcester is reputed to have exclaimed 150 years ago, on hearing that human beings might be descended from apes. "But if it is true, let us hope that it doesn't become widely known!" When it comes to sociobiology - better known these days as "evolutionary psychology" - the bishop's wife has modern counterparts: The religious right and the secular and supposedly scientific left are remarkably on the same page, both sides inclined to dispute or misrepresent the relevance of evolution to human beings.

RANCHO SANTE FE, Calif. -- Religion has faced formidable foes in its history. But atheism hasn't generally been one of them - until today. A recent string of best-selling books has put believers of all stripes on the defensive. Religion, say authors such as Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett and Christopher Hitchens, is an unreasonable form of blind faith, often leading to fanaticism and violence. Reason and science, they contend, are the only proper foundations for forming opinions and understanding the universe.

Kurt Vonnegut, the gentle humanist who challenged Americans to be true to themselves and mistrust technology, wealth and the arrogance of power, died last week, possibly with a bemused appreciation of the fact that all of the ugliest aspects of popular culture he challenged for more than half a century appeared to be thriving. The author of 19 novels and an array of plays and short stories, he struggled to make a living as a writer of science fiction until the success in 1969 of Slaughterhouse-Five, a fictional treatment of his survival as a prisoner of war during the tragic and senseless Allied bombing of Dresden late in World War II. An estimated 135,000 people died in the Dresden firestorm.

I BOUGHT A CAR RECENTLY -- A 2004 Mini Cooper -- and I'm besotted with it. It is yellow with a white roof, and each night, when I get home from work, I obsessively wash away all the debris that has accumulated during the day. Then I park it in the garage and pat it on its hood before saying goodnight. Not only is this behavior ridiculous, it is completely out of character. I've always thought of cars essentially as transportation, demonstrated by my previous ride, a beat-up, rusting 1990 Toyota Camry with 167,000 miles.