What we must decide is how we are valuable rather than how valuable we are.

Friedenberg’s line contrasts two ways of thinking about human worth: a qualitative, purpose-centered question (“how we are valuable”) versus a quantitative, status-centered one (“how valuable we are”). The first invites reflection on the kinds of contributions, relationships, and forms of integrity that give a life meaning; the second tends to reduce persons to rankings, prices, credentials, or comparative esteem. Read this way, the quote critiques modern evaluative habits—grading, credentialism, market metrics, and prestige hierarchies—by insisting that the ethical task is to choose and enact modes of value rather than to chase higher scores in someone else’s scale. It is a call to agency in defining value, not merely competing for it.