Fifty Years of Exclusionary Psychometrics: II. Developments

Abstract

Mathematics originated in knowledge of invariance, and factor theory is of this form, a matter of pure numbers in statistical distributions. Q technique was developed in this framework, with full knowledge of its consequences. The quantum-theoretical approach to subjective psychology stemmed from Spearmanian factorization and his Psychology Down the Ages, and from psychophysics, not from quantum mechanics and physics. Many psychological problems had to be solved before quantum theory could be made substantive, for psychology, including acceptance of abduction as a basis for inference, the rejection of consciousness as substantive and its replacement by communicability, tile operant nature of factors, concourse theory, and the solution/or Newton's Fifth Rule. The result is reported in a series of papers under the title "William James, Niels Bohr, and Complementarity. II They propose that Bohr was correct to suggest that there are only two fundamental sciences, physics and psychology; both, however are subserved by the same quantum theory, developed independently, and the psychology is that of Q methodology.