OK, that makes the source of disagreement clearer.

I agree that "terminal" means "final" (but not that it means "maximal"; that's a different concept). But it doesn't (to me, and I think to others on LW) mean "final" in the sense I think you have in mind (i.e., so supremely important that once you notice it applies you can stop thinking), but in a different sense (when analysing goals or values, asking "so why do I want X?", this is a point at which you can go no further: "well, I just do").

So we're agreed on the etymology: a "terminal" goal or value is one-than-which-one-can-go-no-further. But you want it to mean "no further in the direction of increasing importance" and I want it to mean "no further in the direction of increasing fundamental-ness". I think the latter usage has at least the following two advantages:

• It's possible that people actually have quite a lot of goals and values that are "terminal" in this sense, including ones that are directly relevant in motivating them in ordinary situations. (Whereas it's very rare to come across a situation in which some goal you have is so comprehensively overriding that you don't have to think about anything else.)
• This usage of "terminal" is well established on LW. I think its usage here goes back to Eliezer's post called Terminal Values and Instrumental Values from November 2007. See also the LW wiki entry. This is not a usage I have just invented, and I strongly disagree with your statement that "It's not even what it usually means on LW".

The trouble with Clippy isn't that his paperclip-maximizing goal is terminal, it's that that's his only goal.

I'm not sure whether in your last paragraph you're suggesting that I'm using "terminal" to mean "intermediate in importance", but for the avoidance of doubt I am not doing anything at all like that. There are two separate things here that you could call hierarchies, one in terms of importance and one in terms of explanation, and "terminal" refers (in my usage, which I think is also the LW-usual one) only to the latter.