Yea, honestly I've never seen the exact distinction between goals which have an ethics-rating, and goals which do not. I understand that humans share many ethical intuitions, which isn't surprising given our similar hardware. Also, that it may be possible to define some axioms for "medieval Han Chinese ethics" (or some subset thereof), and then say we have an objectively correct model of their specific ethical code. About the shared intuitions amongst most humans, those could be e.g. "murdering your parents is wrong" (not even "murder is wrong", since that varies across cultures and circumstances). I'd still call those systems different, just as different cars can have the same type of engine.
Also, I understand that different alien cultures, using different "ethical axioms", or whatever they base their goals on, do not invalidate the medieval Han Chinese axioms, they merely use different ones.
My problem with "objectively correct ethics for all rational agents" is, you could say, where the compellingness of any particular system comes in. There is reason to believe an agent such as Clippy could not exist (edit: i.e., it probably could exist), and its very existence would contradict some "'rational' corresponds to a fixed set of ethics" rule. If someone would say "well, Clippy isn't really rational then", that would just be torturously warping the definition of "rational actor" to "must also believe in some specific set of ethical rules".
If I remember correctly, you say at least for humans there is a common ethical basis which we should adopt (correct me otherwise). I guess I see more variance and differences where you see common elements, especially going in the future. Should some bionically enhanced human, or an upload on a spacestation which doesn't even have parents, still share all the same rules for "good" and "bad" as an Amazon tribe living in an enclosed reservation? "Human civilization" is more of a loose umbrella term, and while there certainly can be general principles which some still share, I doubt there's that much in common in the ethical codex of an African child soldier and Donald Trump.
Kawoomba, maybe it would be better for you to think in terms of ethics along the lines of Kant's Categorical Imperative, or social contract theory; ways for agents with different goals to co-operate.
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