I realized now that if there is a single end goal then that implies we should maximize it. That’s if it’s a quantity, if it’s a small digital thing then we either achieve it once and have nothing left to do, or it’s a thing we have to maintain forever.
What about multiple end goals? Then we should try to maximize all of them, except that doesn’t work. If we try to convert them into a single factor then that actually implies there’s a single end goal: to maximize that factor. A combination of one quantitative goal with many other qualitative goals could work. You would try to maintain the qualitative goals while increasing the quantitative goal as much as possible. Actually I don’t think the impossibility of maximizing multiple factors means there couldn’t be multiple quantitative end goals, it’s just that it would be harder for us to use as a guide as opposed to a single quantitative goal.
This pushes my intuition towards thinking there is only a single end goal. I don’t think reality would pose the impossible problem of maximizing multiple end goals.