Scopes are intended to scope down access on PATs to create tokens with the least privilege necessary to fulfill their functions:
The vast majority of ISC APIs require ORG_ADMIN user level, and that user level context can be provided by a PAT with the client credentials grant flow or by a user actively logging in with the authorization code grant flow when generating a token.
We understand the frustration with this requirement, and we hear the feedback loud and clear to provide application based API credentials with greater capabilities.