To solve this problem we would need to first understand the human mind, how it stores data, how it does computation, and how it interacts with names. So we would need the same set of information that we would need for creating AGI. A solution is probably only a couple of months/decades away.

I really have to disagree, why can't you devise a formal method?

- a good name should be descriptive

- avoid being overly clever, call a spade a spade

- don't optimise for generalisation, naming things is a time to be specific

- aim for short but not at the expense of losing context

- avoid redundancy in naming of things nearby, leverage spatial context

- avoid qualifiers or type information where possible - type should be obvious from context and use, if it's not qualify or refactor

Anything else?