What was going on when I was born?

With many banks flush with cash as a result of the recent authorization of accounts paying money market interest rates, some institutions have stepped up their attempts to lend this money to the public. Much of the promotional effort these days is designed to help banks make more credit card and unsecured, or signature, loans. Unsolicited mailings to consumers offering such loans, pending the approval of a credit line, are a major part of this activity. ''We see more and more banks starting to promote loans,'' said Barry Leeds, whose firm, Barry Leeds & Associates, is a bank marketing consultancy. ''They are looking at it as anticyclical and making it part of the ongoing product mix, rather than opening and closing.''

''Common sense and common morals tell us that we cannot stand mute while our prior assistance is used in the consummation of a fraud.'' - Randolph W. Thrower, a lawyer and former head of the Internal Revenue Service. (D21:1.)

Despite a sharp drop in auto sales, the General Motors Corporation today reported that its fourth-quarter net income had jumped 49.5 percent, to $145 million, on the strength of the earnings from its auto financing subsidiary. The final quarter's earnings, equal to 45 cents a share, compared with net income of $95 million, or 31 cents a share, in last year's final quarter. For the full year, net income soared to $963 million, or $3.09 a share, from $333 million, or $1.07 a share, in 1981. The 1982 results include $252.2 million in tax credits and a $688 million profit from G.M.'s nonconsolidated subsidiaries, principally its auto finance arm, the General Motors Acceptance Corporation. G.M.A.C. earned $348 million in 1981.

EIGHTEEN young children who faced almost certain death in infancy are alive and healthy today because of a new technique used in bone marrow transplantation. Photographs of some of the children, all robust, smiling toddlers, can be seen on the wall of a doctor's office at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center where the technique was perfected. Only months before their pictures were taken, they were all tragically wasted by infections and were deathly ill. For each of them, less than an ounce of transplanted bone marrow made the difference. The new technique that saved them promises to make bone marrow transplants far more available than they have been, for people suffering from a variety of serious and potentially fatal diseases. In the long range, bone marrow transplants appear to have greater potential for saving lives than transplants of any major organs such as the heart, kidney or liver. A report on current work in in the field was issued yesterday by the scientists at Sloan-Kettering.

Over the last two decades, Alfred J. Buhler, a lawyer and businessman from Liechtenstein, has been connected in interviews and documents with stock and tax fraud, illegal arms deals, kidnapping and questionable overseas payments on behalf of American corporations. But the Central Intelligence Agency has prevented law-enforcement authorities from even questioning him. Some of the reports of Mr. Buhler's activities, including disguising financial transactions for governments, companies and criminals, are in public records and sworn testimony. Law-enforcement officials in the United States and Canada and sources in Liechtenstein have provided other details. But Mr. Buhler and the C.I.A. have refused to respond to oral and written inquiries about their relationship. Thus, the extent to which his business activities overlap his involvement with the intelligence agency is not clear. The relationship raises questions about how much the agency knew about or was even involved in various financial and political scandals, and it illustrates the conflict that arises from time to time between the C.I.A. and law-enforcement authorities.

IN light of a proposal by New York State Education Commissioner Gordon M. Ambach to start children in school at age 4 and have them graduate by age 16, educators, psychologists and others are debating whether it is possible or sensible to speed up the learning process in such a fashion. Under the Commissioner's plan, youngsters would be placed in kindergarten at 4, would start the first grade at 5 and would graduate from high school at 16 after completing the eleventh grade. Currently they start kindergarten at 5 and graduate at 18 after completing the 12th grade. However the answer, most agree, is that no one really knows whether such accelerated schooling is feasible or wise - particularly as concerns younger children. Although there has been much research to document the benefits of preschool programs, there have been virtually no studies of the benefits or disadvantages that stem from the teaching of reading and other academic subjects at an earlier age.

Mayor Koch, trying to invigorate the programs responsible for keeping and attracting jobs and businesses to New York City, announced the appointment of three new commissioners yesterday in a major reorganization of the city's Office of Economic Development. ''Over the years, our economic development programs, while effective, have grown on a piecemeal basis,'' Mr. Koch said at a City Hall news conference. ''This realignment plan will help us provide better services.'' In announcing the new commissioners and the departments they will head, the Mayor said Herbert Salzman, president of the Starwood Corporation, a private investment company, would become the Commissioner of the Office of International Business Development and would attempt to attract foreign investments and increase local exports.

G.M. reported a 49.5 percent rise in net income in the fourth quarter, to $145 million. For the year, net soared to $963 million, from $333 million, largely as a result of tax credits and the earnings of its finance unit. The report was in line with expectations. (Page D1.) Sears, Roebuck said its fourth-quarter net rose 37.9 percent, largely because of a strong performance by its merchandising group and by its growing array of financial subsidiaries. (D1.) CBS's net fell 11.9 percent. (D5.) Kaiser Steel earned $9.8 million, in contrast to a $515.2 million loss a year ago. (D5.) Halliburton's net fell 46.8 percent, while Lone Star's fell 17.6 percent and Texas Instruments' rose 16.1 percent. (D5.)

The American Bar Association voted today to require lawyers to keep their clients' secrets even when the clients are committing large financial frauds or other white-collar crimes. The action was a setback for sponsors of a proposed new model code of legal ethics. They had pushed for rules recognizing that while lawyers should keep their clients' affairs confidential this responsibility can sometimes be transcended by the duty of being honest in dealing with others. Today's vote was a victory for lawyers who think they owe almost unqualified confidentiality to their clients. The vote of 207 to 129 by the policy-making House of Delegates amended the proposed ethics code to bar lawyers from ''blowing the whistle'' even when they learn that their clients are using them in criminal conspiracies that are continuing. An exception would be crimes ''likely to result in imminent death or substantial bodily harm.''

PONTIAC, Mich. THERE is a section in most automobile assembly plants that is not usually shown to visitors. It is the place where burly men with rubber mallets and wooden wedges grapple with sticking doors and misaligned hoods, pounding and twisting them until they fit functionally, if not very well. This need for crude adjustments has seemed to be one of the inevitable, though unwelcome, byproducts of the mass production of stamped sheet metal: the accumulation of errors, no one of which is beyond allowable limits, but which together add up to a door that will not close properly or a fender that does not line up. Most of these errors are impossible to eliminate completely. The thickness of the steel coming into a plant varies from shipment to shipment, the forming dies wear, even the welding itself heats and deforms the metal. Some European auto makers solve the problem with hand labor and custom fitting, and simply charge more for the final product. Japanese car makers rely on a highly motivated work force and a close network of parts suppliers. But engineers at General Motor's Pontiac Division have developed a process for close-tolerance bodywork that may not require Japanese labor relations or Mercedes-Benz sticker prices. And this process is the result of what many have thought has long been lacking in the once dominant American auto industry: important technological innovation.

Sears, Roebuck & Company, the nation's largest retailer, reported yesterday that its fourth-quarter net income rose 37.9 percent, to $459.4 million, or $1.31 a share, on the strong performance of the merchandising group of Sears and its growing array of financial subsidiaries. The earnings for the final quarter compared with $333.1 million, or $1.05 a share, a year earlier. Revenue for the period rose 11.3 percent, to $8.9 billion, from $8 billion.

President Reagan's Commission on Strategic Forces is considering recommending development of a small intercontinental missile with a single warhead that could be deployed in specially armored carriers, according to sources close to the panel. They said this would be in addition to recommending that the proposed MX missiles be placed in existing silos. The sources, who requested anonymity, said the small missile could be driven around military bases in the armored vehicles and perhaps carried to different bases by helicopter. Breakthrough in Armor The armoring and design of the carriers, said to be a dramatic breakthrough in technology, combined with their mobility, would supposedly allow the missiles to survive a first strike by Soviet nuclear weapons.