This Week I Learned - Week 26 2026

This Week I Learned - 

* "Hallucination is a feature when you’re being creative." - S Anand

* "AI doesn't have to be right to be useful. The goal is outputs you can iterate over time — not perfection on the first try." - Agentic Thinking 101, Udacity

* "...language models hallucinate because the training and evaluation procedures reward guessing over acknowledging uncertainty" - Why Language Models Hallucinate

* "Large language models (LLMs) do not work like databases, storing facts in neat rows and columns, and retrieving the right answer when asked. They are trained on enormous collections of text and learn statistical patterns in language. When prompted, they generate a response by predicting what will come next, one piece at a time.

An LLM generates text one word at a time, each word a probability drawn from patterns it absorbed during training. A setting called the temperature governs how adventurous those draws are. If the temperature is low, the model will pick the safest, most predictable next word and produce an accurate and dull output. If the temperature is higher, the model will reach into the less likely options and begin to surprise you. This is the dial you turn up when you want a poem instead of a weather report.

The trouble is that the same dial governs hallucinations. 

...hallucinations are not bugs to be patched but a statistical inevitability of how these systems are trained and tested.

The difference between AI systems and human societies is that the latter developed methods to discipline imagination: science uses experiments, journalism uses verification and philosophy uses argument

AI needs something similar: not a ban on hallucinations but better institutions of verification around it." - Viraj Kulkarni in The Hindu

* OpenCode is an open source agent that helps you write and run code with any AI model. It's available as a terminal-based interface, desktop app, or IDE extension. 

* Kilo Code is a free, open-source coding agent for VS Code, JetBrains IDEs, and the CLI. It gives you access to 500+ AI models with zero markup, multiple agent modes, and no vendor lock-in.

AI coding assistant in 2026 fall into one of three buckets:

• IDE extensions (GitHub Copilot, Kilo Code, Cline, Roo Code) that plug into VS Code or JetBrains and let you pick your own models.
• Standalone AI editors (Cursor, Windsurf) that fork VS Code and build proprietary agents on top.
• CLI and terminal agents (Claude Code, Kilo CLI) that run alongside your existing editor.

* GSAP (GreenSock Animation Platform) is a framework-agnostic JavaScript animation library for the modern web.

* Speaker Coach in PowerPoint recommends that presenters speak at a rate of 100 to 165 words per minute; this is the rate at which most audiences find it easiest to process the information they hear.

* Stacked area chart on the right visualizes the demographic segments of China using three layered color bands. It illustrates the core relationship between the working-age population and the merged dependent populations (young and old). The layout visually demonstrates that as the bottom base (working age) narrows rapidly, it must support a combined upper mass (merged dependents) that is increasingly made up of elderly citizens, mirroring the main headline's warning regarding a "huge burden on the shrinking population."

* Colleges & technical institutes in India are now advertising number of students who have been selected for Google Summer of Code 

* Interesting use of IoT with a public-benefit spinoff - Atomberg Intellon Adaptive Water Purifier has the ability to sense water’s TDS and uses RO only when necessary. If TDS is within safe limits, it switches to UF & UV (non RO mode).  

Using anonymized TDS data from tens of thousands of Atomberg water purifiers installed across the country, combined with publicly available data from different government sources, it has built a free tool where you can enter your pincode and check water quality - TDS levels, TDS variance, chemicals present etc - for your locality.

* Starfish are not fish – Despite their name, starfish are echinoderms, closely related to sea urchins, sand dollars, and sea cucumbers, and they lack gills, scales, and fins like true fish do. Starfish can extend their stomachs through their mouths to digest prey externally, then retract the stomach back into their body once digestion is complete. Starfish can regrow lost arms, and in some cases, an entire new starfish can grow from a single arm if part of the central disc is attached

* Cultural traditions can spark groundbreaking science—Tu Youyou won the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for developing a life-saving antimalarial drug inspired by traditional Chinese medicine.

* Since Brexit (2016), the U.K. has seen 10 Home Secretaries, nine Foreign Secretaries, eight Chancellors of the Exchequer and six Prime Ministers.

* Wimbledon has increased its 2026 prize fund to £64.2 million/Rs 800 crore.

* Meta has invested $900 million into credit card payments and lending platform Cred for a 20% stake. Kunal Shah, founder of Cred, is joining WhatsApp as its global head, taking charge of a product used by 3 billion people around the world. He takes over from Will Cathcart, who assumed the role in 2019, a period when India emerged as WhatsApp's largest market. Shah also built and sold Freecharge during the mid-2010s.

* Fun fact - Count of IAS Officers with following names in the IAS Directory (compiled by Vonter):

• "Rajeev" - 40
• "Rajeev Ranjan" - 8
• "Rajeev Sharma" - 6
• "Rajeev Kumar" - 4

* There are at least 6 lakh students who study French and 1.5 lakh students who study German in all schools across India spread across various grades, including CBSE schools.

* More than 1.6 lakh buildings in Mumbai are now over thirty years old and due for structural audits.

* "Email is a wonderful thing for people whose role in life is to be on top of things. But not for me; my role is to be on the bottom of things. What I do takes long hours of studying and uninterruptible concentration. I try to learn certain areas of computer science exhaustively; then I try to digest that knowledge into a form that is accessible to people who don't have time for such study." - Prof. Donald E.  Knuth

* "...being first matters little if you cannot scale. The AI race may ultimately be won by those who make intelligence affordable, ubiquitous and widely available. The next phase of India’s technological journey must combine self-reliance with global ambition. The challenge is no longer merely to invent; it is to build, scale, commercialise and create enterprises that can compete globally." - Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw