1 Confessions of a Moral Schizophrenic* By Jayme Johnson I ...

psychologically fragile state, and is perhaps even self-deceived about his ethical position.
These clues, once again, seem to point toward the sophisticate having fallen on the second
horn of the dilemma and having hidden this fact from himself.
VII. Final Thoughts
If what has been put forth is accurate, no matter which of these two interpretations
of Railton’s sophisticated consequentialism one might subscribe to, the sophisticate will be
morally schizophrenic. Perhaps there is evidence for this independent of how the
counterfactual condition is interpreted. Consider once again, the way in which the
condition is stated: while the sophisticated consequentialist ordinarily does not do what he
does simply for the sake of doing what’s right, he would seek to lead a different sort of life
if he did not think his were morally defensible. Before one even attempts to regulate one’s
dispositions using this condition, if one considered what this condition was
recommending, the would-be sophisticate may find himself in the face of a near
contradiction. When applied to friendships, the condition effectively prescribes doing
what will bring about the best results overall, and while this is not the reason for having
friends, if it happened that having friends wasn’t what brought about the best results
overall, then don’t do it anymore. The contradictoriness of this is perhaps better seen in
this analogous condition: “don’t do an act for the sake of the money, but if there is no
money, don’t do it.” 46 No wonder the result of trying to develop a set of dispositions
using this condition to mediate seems to lead to a psychologically unhealthy state. It
46 Thanks to Fred Feldman for pointing this analogy out to me.
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