II. Mathematical modelling of election predictions: Comments to Simon's reply

Herbert A. Simon's reply (Inquiry, Vol. 25, No. 3) to my criticism of his 1954 paper is not to the point. He fails to respond to some of my arguments and misconceives others. One of his misconceptions is that any mathematical deduction from empirical premises which are formulated mathematically will necessarily lead to empirically valid conclusions. This claim is particularly unwarrantable in Simon's case since his mathematical premise, the continuity of the reaction function, is empirically meaningless.     

I. Mathematical modeling of election predictions: Final reply to professor Aubert

Professor Aubert's ‘three‐stage rocket’ (Inquiry, Vol. 26 [1983], No. 1) has reached periodic orbit. His comments on my earlier reply to his critique of my election predictions paper simply repeat arguments I have already refuted. In this note, I limit myself largely to pointing out Professor Aubert's misconceptions of what my position actually is. I find no reasons for revising the views stated in my original election predictions paper, nor any reasons for thinking that paper violated norms of scientific method that prevail in the natural sciences.     

The sin of subjectivism: A reply to Shapiro

Shapiro criticises our book on two grounds. He first outlines a series of mistakes. None of them we believe, in fact, have been made and this is usually quite clear from our book. His second criticism rejects our ‘subjectivist’ approach to measurement. We argue that he misrepresents our methods and fails to grasp their ability both to collect accurate data and deal adequately with possible sources of bias. Indeed in these, in its attention to the dating of both independent and dependent variables, and in the flexibility of its approach to the respondent, we feel our approach is better equipped than other existing instruments to tackle the problem of the aetiological role of psycho-social factors in illness.     

The contract ground: A reply to Jesse Kalin

Philosophical Studies -     

The missing link: A reply to Joseph Rychlak

We oppose Rychlak's (1991a, 1991b) claim that the view of mind entailed in artificial intelligence (AD and cognitive psychology is fundamentally at odds with Kelly's (1955) personal construct theory. Kelly's model and Al have much in common: They both are centrally concerned with representation, cognitive processes and their structure, and are ultimately empirical in their methodology. Many Al researchers have usefully embraced personal construct theory as a working conceptual framework, in this article, we examine Rychlak's assertions and identify several mistakes.     

Representations, predictions, and remembrances in CHARM: a reply to Lindsay (1991)

Lindsay (1991), in his comment CHARMed, but not Convinced: Comment on Metcalfe (1990), acknowledged that distributed models of human memory using the construct of a composite memory trace, such as the Composite Holographic Associative Recall Model (CHARM), are able to account for most of the findings within the eyewitness-testimony paradigm. Despite this success, Lindsay found CHARM to be of limited usefulness as a model of eyewitness suggestibility. The reasons stated for this peculiar conclusion are discussed in this rebuttal.     

The General Factor of Personality: A reply to Muncer

In previous studies we have shown that a General Factor of Personality (GFP) occupies the apex of the hierarchy of personality as well as the apex of the personality disorders in the same way that g, the general factor of mental ability, occupies the apex in the organization of cognitive abilities (Rushton & Irwing, 2011). In a critique, Muncer (2011) re-analyzed one of our data sets and concluded there was no evidence for a GFP. He also argued against the evolutionary theory we had proposed for the origin of the GFP. In this rejoinder I rebut Muncer’s conclusion and describe how directional selection can explain the GFP.     

The virtues of scientific psychology: A reply to Harzem

Harzem recently expressed the opinions that, beginning in the 1960s, the progress of scientific psychology has been deferred and that psychological research has failed to address important social issues. He proposed that progress be resumed by taking up, anew, the experimental analysis of behavior. The present reply provides evidence inconsistent with Harzem's assertions regarding the state of contemporary, scientific psychology and questions the wisdom of disregarding the significant body of data and theory that currently are available to pursue the, as yet, unfulfilled promises of the experimental analysis of human behavior.