A Critical Study of the Doctrine of Revelation as Held by Three Contemporary American Theologians -- Georgia Harkness, Nels F.S. Ferré, and Edwin Lewis -- In the Light of the Wesleyan View

Men are curious beings. They like to know. According to the Biblical account of the fall of man he was tempted and fell at this very point. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was desired by Adam and Eve to make them wise. The Bible shows that they satisfied this desire to their own detriment. By a little observation, or even introspection, one can see that man still has this desire to know. A trip to the library, to inspect the multitudinous volumes on a myriad of subjects, should convince the most skeptical person of the human desire to know. Men not only want to know, they also want to know how and why they know. The same library would contain many volumes treating the sources and nature of knowledge. Some of the greatest minds in history have dealt with this problem. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Roger Bacon, Francis Bacon, Locke, Hume, Leibnitz, Spinoza, Kant, Hegel and many other eminent men have seriously studied the problem of knowledge

Contrary prescriptions: Recognizing good practice tensions in management

This paper is concerned with rethinking the notion of 'good management practice'. It explicates a way of framing management theory in terms of tensions between apparently contradictory pieces of good practice advice. The relevance of this, as a practical conceptualization that could usefully inform managers about the kinds of considerations they might take account of in both their day to day and longer term management thinking, is explored. The emerging theoretical framework is elaborated in terms of some characteristics of, and language about, tensions together with possible levels of use of the concept to inform practice. It is suggested that the use of the approach necessarily implies a view of the user as a reflective practitioner

Global economic burden of unmet surgical need for appendicitis

Background There is a substantial gap in provision of adequate surgical care in many low- and middle-income countries. This study aimed to identify the economic burden of unmet surgical need for the common condition of appendicitis. Methods Data on the incidence of appendicitis from 170 countries and two different approaches were used to estimate numbers of patients who do not receive surgery: as a fixed proportion of the total unmet surgical need per country (approach 1); and based on country income status (approach 2). Indirect costs with current levels of access and local quality, and those if quality were at the standards of high-income countries, were estimated. A human capital approach was applied, focusing on the economic burden resulting from premature death and absenteeism. Results Excess mortality was 4185 per 100 000 cases of appendicitis using approach 1 and 3448 per 100 000 using approach 2. The economic burden of continuing current levels of access and local quality was US $92 492 million using approach 1 and$73 141 million using approach 2. The economic burden of not providing surgical care to the standards of high-income countries was $95 004 million using approach 1 and$75 666 million using approach 2. The largest share of these costs resulted from premature death (97.7 per cent) and lack of access (97.0 per cent) in contrast to lack of quality. Conclusion For a comparatively non-complex emergency condition such as appendicitis, increasing access to care should be prioritized. Although improving quality of care should not be neglected, increasing provision of care at current standards could reduce societal costs substantially