Goals? Scale it down a bit
Ed. note:There's been some discussion of goals and wants in various channels. Here's some scribbling that tries to take the discussion from a cosmological (or speculatively fictional) scope down towards something that might be useful.
Life is a series of decisions and their consequences. Better access to information (d/i/k/w)data is correlated with better decisions. Better decisions are those whose consequences are desirable to the actor as in the aphorism "Nation-states, tribes, families, and individuals all act in what they perceive to be their best interest". Technology (tools) helps people make and execute decisions and can insulate them from some consequences. So, we are certainly in favour of information sharing and technology development in so far as these things are likely to benefit good decisions. Information access and technology access are key features of advanced societies noted by history for their accomplishments, sometimes called civilisations.
The root goal at the top of all others is no less than enduring human civilisation. Therefore all lesser goals and their actions should be trying further the development or preservation of civilisation or at worst should not directly oppose it. Similarly as we have found that information sharing and technology development are key to life and civilisation our work should not disrupt information flow or technological development and availability whenever possible.
Let's squint a bit as we accelerate and zoom in. A few things likely have to happen to ensure the primary goal. Colonization of other planets and star systems is a commonly cited one. Another near-trope is a unified human government (or an effective replacement). Scaling down a bit further we see more obvious and less fictional requirements: all sentients must have access to information and technology and this strongly implies their physical needs are met. So, we covering the bottom tiers of Mazlow's hierarchypyr becomes a planetary goal for all humans (and all sentients). Major historical documents including the Magna Carta, UN Declaration of Human Rights, French Déclaration des droits de l'Homme et du Citoyen, and US Declaration of Independence provide some of the framework for these ideals but the machinery (institutions) to bring about these changes is weak or absent.
... Me? I just explain things ...
data Data->Information->Knowledge->Wisdom in order of increasing rarity, value, cost to produce, and difficultly of transmission ... as must be noted somewhere else
pyr> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs