I think what to do is a more personal thing, from which one takes care of others and the world:-

Smile, be kind and have compassion, don't judge others unfairly, do what is good and right, say only good things of others, and don't remain silent or inactive in the face of true injustice or cruelty. Respect all life. This is the human challenge and journey.

To this I would also add in these difficult times… Understand that much of what we are told is opinion rather than fact. Our own formed opinions and views based on them should be considered potentially unreliable and should be questioned.

I don't believe you can choose to make good (whatever that means) things. You can certainly choose not to try, but choosing to try and believing you'll succeed is a recipe for disappointment in my opinion. All you can do is make a sincere effort at whatever you choose to do and the world will decide if it's good or not.

I found myself thinking about something similar recently. It had to do with the Optifye.ai fiasco, and the difference between solving problems / creating things for the 'common man' vs. for the 'ruling class'. I think I much prefer the former.

Meta comment but … I find the title of “What to do” vs. “What should one do” (topic first sentence) to mean two slightly different things.

> The kind of people who make good new things don't need rules to keep them honest.

Seriously? People have done horrible things in the name of "progress". For example, shipping slaves from another continent to make good new things.

Every single essay is the same from this guy.

Make something amazing is not an insight.

"Make good new things."

But what are the good new things? The new part is pretty clear, as in something that wasn't done before. But what does the adjective "good" mean when applied to "new things"?

The author says you should make sure "new things you make don't net harm people or the world."

I'd argue that the world has no meaning without people, so not "net harming people" is what he can mean. But how can one know if things will produce net harm or not? I think we can even quantify after the fact if discovering gunpowder or dynamite is producing net harm or not. We can't decide if discovery of nuclear fission and nuclear fusion is producing a net harm or not.

Of course, for some "things" it's easy to say if they produce a net harm or not, i.e. producing a biological weapon or a vaccine.

And what if the result of our struggle, be it a scientific endeavor or not, while "new" and certainty not harmful doesn't produce any impact whatsoever? Maybe we come up with something that will be usable in a few years, a few decades, e few hundreds of years years or never.

So, should be there an impact? Shouldn't we strive to produce something that is not only not harmful but useful?

I think that we should give some more thought about the "good" part.