 While both threshold and scalar conceptions of moral status allow for degrees of moral status, each faces its own set of difficulties. For example, it is not enough for those who hold the threshold view to stipulate that, for example, the capacity to do an activity well does not affect one’s status. Once the importance of some feature, such as the capacity to value, is highlighted, it seems that not only the possession of the capacity but also how well one can exercise it is morally relevant to one’s status. This is especially compelling when we compare, for example, an ordinary human adult’s capacity to set many ends (i.e, to value and pursue many objects and states of affairs) with the capacity of an impoverished being who, in its lifetime, “can set just a few ends and make just a few choices based on considering two or three simple alternatives” (Arneson 1999, pp. 119–120). The problems is essentially the same regardless of whether the capacity is actual, potential, or incompletely realized (e.g., when we compare an unimpaired baby’s potential – ability to have an ability – to set many ends with an impaired baby whose potential is far more limited).