Technical Credibility Research Articles

Model Pembelajaran Multikulturalisme Guru Pendidikan Agama Islam

Information technology is increasingly developing and has an impact on the fact that the world seems to be borderless, which is a challenge in the world of education, especially Islamic religious education. The term global village as an impact of globalization leads to a model of life in which various cultures meet and interact more intensely ideological contestation, and cross-cultural communication. Therefore this reality must be addressed wisely and prudently. If cultural diversity and differences are not managed properly, it will have an impact on disharmony and polarization in society. One of the efforts to respond to this reality is multiculturalism. Education in Indonesia, especially Islamic education, requires a learning model based on multiculturalism, bearing in mind that Indonesia as a plural country is required to care for and manage its diversity properly. This study took the locus of Mojokerto district where the subject of this study was a PAI teacher. This study uses a qualitative approach to data that will be collected and analyzed and tested for its validity through technical credibility, transferability, confirmability, and dependability. The results of the study illustrate that the multiculturalism learning model for PAI teachers is based on the reality of the elements and structure of PAI learning including multiculturalism and its values. In addressing the cultural diversity of students, teachers practice multicultural values ​​such as tolerance. In the realm of objectives, materials, media, methods, and evaluation of Islamic education teachers are required to internalize it with multiculturalism and its values ​​such as tolerance and mutual respect.

Energy and Exergy Analyses for Flue Gas Assisted Organic Rankine Cycle

Effective use of industrial heat waste at low and medium temperatures is seen as one of the solutions that can be used to increase energy efficiency and reduce the problem of environmental pollution. Within the understanding of this framework, the organic Rankine cycle (ORC) maintains to gain attention and further development by researchers and/or manufacturers due to its technical and economical use and credibility. This study presents thermodynamic and economic analyses on flue gas assisted organic Rankine cycle (FGA-ORC) based on both concepts of energy and exergy. The heat source for the FGA-ORC system is the exhaust flue gas of the stenter machine, which is highly used in the textile finishing process. In this study, an optimization investigation has been carried out for a cycle architecture, which converts thermal energy into electrical and/or mechanical energy. The effect of the working parameters of the stenter frame on the performance indicators such as efficiency, performance ratio and economic profit was parametrically analysed, and the net-work, exergy destruction and efficiency values were determined. The results of these analyses showed that the optimum working parameters of the FGA-ORC system were P1=1311 kPa, Pmid=970 kPa, Tgas,in=140oC, PC=35%, To=25oC for an exergetic efficiency of 68.86%.

Business models competition based on knowledge assets

All organisations have trouble pointing out exactly what makes their customers choose their services. During great uncertainty, knowing all the details count as to be successful and to gain a new business. This research was designed to understand the main causes to close a deal in B2B, in the management consulting around Europe. The aim was to determine if it is possible to isolate the relevant features responsible for the acceptance of service proposals in management consulting context based on historical data. The objectives were to highlight these variables, use them to construct a predictive model, and suggest performance improvements, to allow organisations to manage their time more effectively and efficiently. The sample was used to train a logistic regression model which achieved excellent classifications. The findings of the research rank the most critical success factors in B2B consulting which determines customer conversion and shows that variables' technical credibility at the proposal stage and budget availability are the ones more influential to close a deal.

Unfit for purpose: reassessing the development and deployment of French nuclear weapons (1956–1974)

ABSTRACT This article presents the first reassessment of the strategic rationality and credibility of French nuclear weapons policy before 1974. Building on untapped primary material from across the world as well as technical analysis, it shows that early Cold War French nuclear weapon procurement and deployment are incompatible with a precise grand design and the requirements of strategic rationality. The first generation of French nuclear forces also lacked technical credibility, despite reliance on outside help. Several French officials knew about it, as did their allies and adversaries. These findings de-exceptionalise French nuclear history and challenge conventional wisdom about Cold War nuclear history.

Adaptation planning in large cities is unlikely to be effective

The assessment of public adaptation policies, strategies and plans to evaluate progress, effectiveness and long-term sustainability is challenging. The potential to develop an ex-post evaluation linked to outcomes is limited given the lack of policy implementation globally and the uncertainty related to when and how impacts will happen. Ex-ante evaluations, by contrast, seem more feasible when they focus on policy processes, contents and outputs. Yet, proxies that indicate credible outcomes need to be carefully selected. In both cases, how adaptation is integrated in local planning processes, and previous experience by governments seem to be crucial. In this paper we perform an ex-ante evaluation of adaptation planning in 59 cities, identified across a set of 136 coastal cities of over 1 million inhabitants located in developed and developing world regions. We assess 3 major areas: policy and economic credibility, science and technical credibility, and legitimacy. Overall, 53 metrics are used to assess how likely local adaptation policies are to be effective, implemented and sustained in the long-term. This global assessment reveals that current adaptation planning in big global cities has a significant space for improvement and is, overall, unlikely to be effective unless greater effort is invested in financing, regulatory context, monitoring and evaluation, and legitimacy aspects. We also discuss challenges and needs, assuming this sample is representative of current progress of adaptation planning in large cities.

Considering the role of urban types in coproduced policy guidance for sustainability transitions

The imperative to massively and quickly scale sustainability transitions in urban areas globally stands in tension with the sustained commitments required of grounded coproduction efforts that seek to deliver locally credible, relevant, and legitimate pathways for place-specific transitions. Is it possible to develop policy guidance that meets the magnitude of the urban transitions challenge while still leveraging the benefits of coproduction? We suggest that coproducing urban transitions guidance around relevant types of cities, as compared to specific individual cities, offers a potential pathway for scaling the impact of such guidance. However, little work has been done to explicitly interrogate how concepts of credibility, relevance and legitimacy are implicated by relying on urban types in coproduction processes. In this frontiers discussion, we describe what greater emphasis on the use of types and proxies in urban transitions coproduction might entail. Elaborating the concept of ‘coproduction-by-proxy’, we articulate six key premises and draw on two real-world instances of science-policy dialogue to illustrate its operative features. This frontiers discussion aims to supply more structured language for framing debate about whether, and how best, to strategically construct and deploy urban types in coproduction processes for developing urban transitions guidance, with an emphasis on maximizing generalization and impact, while maintaining both technical and political credibility. The discussion argues that exploring the role (and limits) of urban types and proxies in coproduction processes is a key frontier for the iterative science and practice of urban transitions, with implications for advancing both overall urban systems knowledge and place-specific sustainability transitions.

Advocating safe abortion: outcomes of a multi-country needs assessment on the potential role of national societies of obstetrics and gynecology.

In 2019 the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) embarked on an initiative that aims to strengthen the capacity of 10 national societies of obstetrics and gynecology (ObGyn) in advocacy for safe abortion. In 2018 needs assessments that entailed a desk study, interviews, and stakeholder workshops were conducted in Benin, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Mali, Mozambique, Panama, Peru, Uganda, and Zambia. The general aim of the needs assessments was to gain a deeper understanding of the contextual situation and identify the needs of ObGyn societies in relation to safe abortion advocacy. This paper provides a cross‐country analysis of the outcomes of the needs assessments and reflects on the capabilities, barriers, and opportunities to strengthen this role of ObGyn societies. Common barriers, such as unavailability of services, lack of technical guidance, unawareness and ambiguity about the legal framework, provider attitudes, and abortion stigma, pose challenges for ObGyn societies to work constructively on safe abortion advocacy. However, ObGyn societies have a strong position due to their strategic networks and technical credibility and can be a facilitator in healthcare providers’ advocacy role. Five strategies were developed to strengthen the capacity of ObGyn societies in safe abortion advocacy.

A practical dialogue protocol for sustainability science to contribute to regional resources management: its implementation in Réunion

Over the last decade, adaptive co‐management has been recommended as a policy framework to address complex and uncertain resources management issues. Implementing this theoretical management concept requires the integration of multidisciplinary research and local knowledge. Yet practical protocols to link science, policymaking and societies have yet to be developed. We designed a protocol to produce legitimate, credible and relevant solutions to a regional resources management issue. This is a two‐component protocol. A stakeholder grid categorizes stakeholder representatives in three distinct specialized dialogue arenas: institution representatives, technical experts and local end‐users. An iterative co‐design process then builds on these arenas to assess the institutional legitimacy, technical credibility and empirical relevance dimensions of a common solution initiated by an initial plausible promise. We tested this framework in Réunion to address organic waste management issues at the regional level. The plausible solution explored was the introduction of a recycling industry involved in collecting organic waste and producing and selling organic fertilizers tailored for local crop systems. The protocol application outcomes were consolidated and documented scenarios accepted by all, with knowledge exchange and the broad spread of a stabilized expectation contributing to private initiatives and public policy change.

Avoiding self-inflicted wounds to the credibility of the US nuclear deterrent

ABSTRACTNuclear deterrence requires not only the reliability of a state’s strategic weapons and the willingness of its leaders to employ them but also an adversary’s appreciation of these conditions. Weapons perceived as failing to hold their targets at risk may lack deterrent value, just as retaliatory threats that are not believable may fail to deter, even if a state’s operational capabilities are robust. Both the technical and political credibility of the US nuclear deterrent may have suffered self-inflicted harm since the end of the Cold War, often as casualties of intemperate policy debates. In particular, doubts have been sowed about the reliability of aging US warheads under a science-based stockpile-stewardship regime meant to substitute for nuclear-explosive testing. Likewise, the credibility of US deterrent threats may have waned as American leaders have spoken ever more stridently about the horrors of nuclear war and nuclear terrorism, underscoring their extreme aversion to the risk of nuclear attack. Diminished credibility in both spheres threatens to compromise US national-security objectives ranging from nuclear nonproliferation to the outcomes of nuclear crises.

Opportunities for saving and reallocating agricultural water to alleviate water scarcity

As water scarcity worsens globally, there is growing interest in finding ways to reduce water consumption, and for reallocating water savings to other uses including environmental restoration. Because irrigated agriculture is responsible for more than 90% of all consumptive water use in water-scarce regions, much attention is being focused on opportunities to save water on irrigated farms. At the same time, many recent journal articles have expressed concern that claims of water-saving potential in irrigation systems lack technical credibility, or are at least exaggerated, due to failures to properly account for key elements of water budgets such as return flows. Critics have also asserted that opportunities for reallocating irrigation savings to other uses are limited because any freed-up water is taken up by other farmers. A comprehensive literature and internet survey was undertaken to identify well-documented studies of water-saving strategies in irrigated agriculture, as well as a review of case studies in which water savings have been successfully transferred to other uses. Our findings suggest that there is in fact considerable potential to reduce consumptive water use in irrigation systems when proper consideration is given to water budget accounting, and those savings can be beneficially reallocated to other purposes.

Expectations of privacy and trust: examining the views of IT professionals

The growth of interactive online lifestyles and social networks has arguably left IT users more exposed to privacy breaches. While governments continue to revise privacy legislation, the issue of online business relationships and privacy expectations remain contentious. Indeed, fewer studies have explored the expectations of users who willingly and knowingly engage in online activities that carry privacy risks. In this study, we examine the expectations and attitudes towards online privacy of a select group of 102 IT professionals. Using a qualitative survey, we show that these users have expectations of online privacy, particularly securing and protecting information from unknown third parties. Unfortunately, these expectations may go unsatisfied with third-party monitoring enabling information disclosure. In response, users argue that enhanced technical and complementary administrative measures should be actively pursued to improve privacy outcomes. The article builds further understanding of privacy expectations and trust behaviours, while exposing the importance of technical credibility from the online organisation and user perspectives.

Big Data and Technical Credibility [President's Message

Presents the President's message that discusses new trends that will impact the industry applications field, focusing on the concept of big data.

When Navigation Trumps Visual Dynamism: Hospital Website Usability and Credibility

In-depth interviews about hospital websites were conducted with 15 participants ranging in age, gender, occupation, and computer proficiency. Interviewees completed detailed usability tasks along with questionnaires that gauged perceptions of organizational and website credibility, including visual and technical dynamism. Participants ranked the most dynamic site lower than the less dynamic one because of navigation difficulties. Researchers advocate including usability tasks in website studies, rather than assessing perceptions based on short-term browsing protocols. They present a schema of website concepts organized into language credibility, visual credibility, and technical credibility that can be used in future research or by health communication practitioners. A list of best practices in navigation features is also included.

Equity-oriented monitoring in the context of universal health coverage.

Monitoring inequalities in health is fundamental to the equitable and progressive realization of universal health coverage (UHC). A successful approach to global inequality monitoring must be intuitive enough for widespread adoption, yet maintain technical credibility. This article discusses methodological considerations for equity-oriented monitoring of UHC, and proposes recommendations for monitoring and target setting. Inequality is multidimensional, such that the extent of inequality may vary considerably across different dimensions such as economic status, education, sex, and urban/rural residence. Hence, global monitoring should include complementary dimensions of inequality (such as economic status and urban/rural residence) as well as sex. For a given dimension of inequality, subgroups for monitoring must be formulated taking into consideration applicability of the criteria across countries and subgroup heterogeneity. For economic-related inequality, we recommend forming subgroups as quintiles, and for urban/rural inequality we recommend a binary categorization. Inequality spans populations, thus appropriate approaches to monitoring should be based on comparisons between two subgroups (gap approach) or across multiple subgroups (whole spectrum approach). When measuring inequality absolute and relative measures should be reported together, along with disaggregated data; inequality should be reported alongside the national average. We recommend targets based on proportional reductions in absolute inequality across populations. Building capacity for health inequality monitoring is timely, relevant, and important. The development of high-quality health information systems, including data collection, analysis, interpretation, and reporting practices that are linked to review and evaluation cycles across health systems, will enable effective global and national health inequality monitoring. These actions will support equity-oriented progressive realization of UHC.

Russia and the US in the Cold War arms race

Frank von Hippel’s invaluable firsthand account (Physics Today, September 2013, page 41)—about the influence of nongovernment organizations (NGOs) on defusing the Cold War arms race—deservedly reflects the leadership and influence that he and others contributed. With regard to supportive and complementary activities involving other American and European NGOs, his focused chronicle is unavoidably incomplete. A supplement to the backstage narrative can be found in reference 11. A. DeVolpi, Nuclear Insights: The Cold War Legacy, Amazon.com, 2009. 9780977773428, especially its first volume.When the original Federation of American Scientists (FAS) chapter at the University of Chicago migrated in the 1950s to Argonne National Laboratory, additional experienced physicists and nuclear engineers joined the group, which continued its public-interest activities. The chapter provided indispensable technical credibility to various NGOs, ultimately including the multifaceted arms-control collaborations of volunteer professionals. Because of the intimidating Cold War cultural atmosphere for untenured scientists, that conscientious support often resulted in personal and occupational sacrifice in professional employment, promotion, prospective funding, and security clearances.Active and retired national laboratory scientists who worked on nuclear weapons and reactors also provided unsanctioned professional contributions through voluntary technical consultation and advice, partly reflected in von Hippel’s reference 9.In addition, there were contributions by specialists from other disciplines and by eminent political figures, professional organizations, segments of the media, venturesome academics, and benevolent funding sources. Peace movements in the West, along with Soviet refuseniks and high-level apparatchiks, were important standard-bearers, often arrayed against entrenched defense establishments and national-defense hardliners who relied on worst-case analysis and political intractability. The Natural Resources Defense Council, under the leadership of Thomas Cochran and Christopher Paine, was an American NGO that indeed had a sustained groundbreaking role, along with the FAS.Amplification of unofficial American collaboration with the Committee of Soviet Scientists came about as European NGOs gradually expanded their own multilateral activities related to aspects of both nuclear and nonnuclear weapons during the Cold War confrontation and its post-Soviet aftermath.These remarks augment von Hippel’s article and do not detract from his widely recognized leadership.REFERENCESection:ChooseTop of pageREFERENCE <<CITING ARTICLES1. A. DeVolpi, Nuclear Insights: The Cold War Legacy, Amazon.com, 2009. 9780977773428, Google Scholar© 2014 American Institute of Physics.

Predictive Models in Urology

Predictive modeling is emerging as an important knowledge-based technology in healthcare. The interest in the use of predictive modeling reflects advances on different fronts such as the availability of health information from increasingly complex databases and electronic health records, a better understanding of causal or statistical predictors of health, disease processes and multifactorial models of ill-health and developments in nonlinear computer models using artificial intelligence or neural networks. These new computer-based forms of modeling are increasingly able to establish technical credibility in clinical contexts. The current state of knowledge is still quite young in understanding the likely future direction of how this so-called 'machine intelligence' will evolve and therefore how current relatively sophisticated predictive models will evolve in response to improvements in technology, which is advancing along a wide front. Predictive models in urology are gaining progressive popularity not only for academic and scientific purposes but also into the clinical practice with the introduction of several nomograms dealing with the main fields of onco-urology.

Digital Credibility & Digital Dynamism in Public Relations Blogs

The authors performed a content analysis of 50 blogs related to public relations. The study extended the literature on credibility to investigate visual credibility and technical credibility. Of particular interest was the dimension of dynamism. The results showed that visual credibility and technical credibility were strongly related. In addition, visual dynamism contributed 30% of the variance in visual credibility and technical dynamism explained 46% of the variance in technical credibility. Seven interactive features such as number of links, five customization features like RSS feeds, and six visual features like moving images were also investigated for their associations with visual and technical dynamism and credibility. A proposed model for scholars and practitioners is presented.

Evaluation and Environmental Governance: The Institutionalisation of Ecological Footprinting

This paper applies insights from actor-network theory to extend our understanding of the influence of evaluation techniques in decision making. Rather than assuming that evaluation is influential because of the intrinsic methodological veracity of the technique—that is, because it measures ‘the truth’ of our environmental predicament—it is more useful to view the adoption of evaluation tools in terms of their contested translation into decision-making settings. This is demonstrated by the growing use of the ‘ecological footprint’ (EF), which has been presented as a methodologically robust yet intuitive tool for guiding decisions. By following the use of the EF within a UK local government setting (Cardiff Council), one can see that its influence depended only partly on claims to technical credibility; it also depended upon an array of other institutional and personal commitments. The extent to which the EF was translated into policy settings reflected the way in which it had been institutionalised as an ‘obligatory passage point’ (after Latour) in decision-making arrangements, and careful representation of the implications of footprint measures. Overall, the credibility of the EF—as with other evaluation techniques—can be seen as a complex product of internal properties and institutional settings, but also of wider network-building activities which seek to cement the status of footprint calculations.

The Internet's impact on policy evaluation: information compression and credibility.

As with all media, the Internet structures and frames information, rewarding some information search and decision behaviors while punishing others and, thereby, strongly influences evaluation research results and possibilities. Now that the Internet is for many evaluators the information medium of choice, the impacts of the medium on evaluation deserve careful attention. The objective of this article is to lay groundwork for a theory of the impact of the Internet on evaluation and policy analysis. Questions addressed include the following: (a) What is the impact of the Internet on the evaluator's professional role, work norms, and work habits? (b) Does the use of the Internet affect who is an evaluator or the meaning of professional evaluation? and (c) How does evaluation via Internet affect the technical quality and credibility of evaluation? A key thesis is that the Internet compresses information in the sense that it is not always easy to distinguish among information resources and, especially, the authority of the information provider and the nature of the knowledge warrant. On one hand, the Internet's information compression seems to hold potential for the democratization of evaluation. On the other hand, the diminished ability to make quality distinctions about evaluation-relevant information may undercut the legitimacy of evaluation.

Expertise and International Governance: Eastern Europe and the Adoption of European Union Environmental Legislation

Technical information is a key aspect of governance responses to complex global problems. International relations scholarship emphasizes the role of science and scientific communities for advancing cooperation in a range of issue areas-from public health and the environment to trade, control of nuclear substances, and telecommunications. This literature demonstrates that causal ideas, supported by sufficient political consensus, can be critical in determining the likelihood and form of multilateral agreements. [1] International consensus about policy-relevant knowledge, however, is often difficult to achieve. Technical solutions create distributional problems and incentives to withhold, manipulate, and mistrust information. The economic implications of cooperative agreements for multiple sets of actors can further interfere with the process of effective knowledge communication. One salient question that emerges is how to structure the supply of expertise to enhance its policy relevance and uptake across diffe rent interests, beliefs, and cultures. In this article I address concerns about the sources of credibility and policy influence of expert information. I focus on environmental governance, which exemplifies an issue area that relies heavily on domestic and transnational expertise. I examine environmental assessments [2] as a component of the knowledge-generating process and consider the institutional characteristics of assessments that make them an effective tool for consensus building in environ mental politics. I argue that to serve as a basis for cooperation, assessments need to be politically engaged so as to facilitate a dialogue between experts and relevant political actors. A structure that allows for broad political authorization enhances the credibility, adequacy, and legitimacy of technical information and thus its policy relevance and effectiveness in international environmental governance. I also take into consideration the tension between political consultation in an expertise process and its credibility among the scientific community. A purely technocratic view of science would emphasize the need for expert neutrality and isolation from political interests as a condition for scientific quality and policy effectiveness. I explore this dilemma and conclude that despite the apparent tension between public involvement and scientific integrity, discounting the political dimension of knowledge can be detrimental to its effectiveness as a tool for international collaboration. This conclusion calls for expertise structures and institutions with the capacity to accommodate public communication while maintaining the boundary of technical excellence. In the next section I develop the argument in detail. The analysis identifies the main mechanisms through which consultation with relevant actors enhances the uptake of expert advice and its influence on transnational governance. The environmental negotiations within the context of the European Union (EU) enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) provide empirical ground for evaluating the relevance of the theoretical argument. I consider the role of a range of economic assessments, characterized by different structures, in the preparation of Poland and Bulgaria for the approximation and implementation of EU environmental legislation. By establishing the importance of political involvement in assessment processes, the case studies set the stage for addressing the question of how to achieve such political consultation while maintaining high technical credibility. In the conclusion, I engage this problem in a discussion of the policy implications of the theoretical and empirical analysis. Expertise Structure and Policy Relevance Is knowledge best engaged in decisionmaking from the ivory tower of the expert establishment, or through the active involvement of relevant political viewpoints? This debate dates back to Plato and Aristotle and persists in U. …