The brain-wave analyzer was not referred to in the 1984 draft, but was added sometime before materials were sent to author George Gipe for the novelization. In the final version, as directed by Robert Zemeckis, Doc did not attempt to guess Marty's name. Doc's questions, about what was on Marty's mind, suggest that the analyzer might actually have worked.
Unlike some names that relate to something else (such as Ron Woodward), the names mentioned by Doc seem to have no significance, other than that one guess seems to progress naturally to the next (Danforth to Wentworth, Evan to Melvin, Petrucci to Peter).