This article assumes we can choose a primary goal for an AI. But if that's the case, why not just use Asimov's first law of robotics - do no harm to humans? It has the same benefit of preventing us from getting turned into paperclips, plus the upside that your 3 million dollar robot won't hurl itself off a cliff given the first opportunity.

A tiny thing about Asimov's laws of robotics is, most of his stories involve cases where they don't actually work.

Spoilers for a 73 year old novel, but for instance the plot of Caves of Steel is centered on a robot with a perfectly functional 1st law abetting a murder.

"Runaround" (spoilers, 86 years) involved a robot getting stuck in a loop bouncing between the 2nd and 3rd laws, and a human having to risk their life to unstick the robot.

Et cetera.

What is harm? What is an order? How do you trade off between different kinds of harm, or deal with conflicting orders? The 3 laws are simple to state, but hard to apply consistently in real life.