method or conceptual discipline, but rather represented a way of life and a discovery of one’s self. The philosopher was much more a spiritual adviser than a professor. He exhorted his students to mold themselves through a conversion of attention and through spiritual exercises to follow the paths of wisdom. As Pierre Hadot has noted, the discourse on the transcendent and the spiritual experien...

OBJECTIVES To evaluate the methodological quality of the Palestinian Clinical Practice Guideline for Diabetes Mellitus using the Translated Arabic Version of the AGREE II. DESIGN Methodological evaluation. A cross-cultural adaptation framework was followed to translate and develop a standardised Translated Arabic Version of the AGREE II. SETTING Palestinian Primary Healthcare Centres. PAR...

This paper seeks to contribute to the ongoing discussion of the value of structuration theory as ‘an ontology of potentials’ for empirical research in accounting. In engaging with the two main papers in this issue, it considers issues of methodological bracketing and the extent to which the work of Coad and Glyptis (2013) offers an agency focus rather than an institutional focus for analysis. F...

I discuss motivations for methodological naturalism in science. I argue that methodological naturalism neither needs nor supports metaphysical naturalism. We are the beneficiaries of many generations’ efforts to unlock the mysteries of nature. The best scientific theories of today have achieved unparalleled predictive success, and this success provides some evidence that these theories have lat...

Preparation of this chapter was supported by National Science Foundation Grant no. 1024293 and a grant from the Brady Education Foundation awarded to ASL, and a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship awarded to EDS. Play is too often in the American crosshairs, with those who claim it is a waste of time on the one hand and those who claim it is crucially important to developme...

Several sub-disciplines of engineering are driven by the researchers’ aim of providing positive change to the society through their engineering. These researchers are challenged by the traditional research method of experimental research with a waterfall model which demands clearly defined project definition and functional requirements, and impose a sequential processes leading to the final sys...

Background Epidemiological evidence on the social determinants of health inequity is well-advanced, but considerably less attention has been given to evaluating the impact of public policies addressing those social determinants. Methodological challenges to produce evidence on policy outcomes present a significant barrier to mobilising policy actions for health equities. This review aims to exa...

Delphi is a powerful technique used to seek answers to appropriate questions. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the Delphi technique as a research method. This paper discusses the scientific merit of the Delphi technique by investigating on 41 studies of Journal of Agricultural Education from 1981 to 2013, and 2 studies of Journal of Agricultural Science and Technology. The...

According to functionalism, the family internalizes and transmits society's supposed value consensus from one generation to the next, and such socialization explains morality, social order, and cultural uniformities. I present three investigations tha t challenge the concept of functionalist socialization, and propose alternative theories that may better explain observations. First, I present e...

BACKGROUND Over the past decades there has been a significant increase in the number of published clinical trials in palliative care. However, empirical evidence suggests that there are methodological problems in the design and conduct of studies, which raises questions about the validity and generalisability of the results and of the strength of the available evidence. We sought to evaluate th...