Can you engineer love? An AI scientist and a matchmaker on dating with intention | Summit 2026
AI scientist Rana el Kaliouby and matchmaker Francesca Hogi discuss why Rana gave up her viral dating spreadsheet, and how to date with clear intention while leaving room for serendipity.
The gist
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Rana el Kaliouby rated dates from 1 to 5 with a weighted algorithm, then dropped the spreadsheet because it felt overengineered and left no room for serendipity.
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Francesca Hogi teaches the meet cute mindset, the belief that every outing could lead to someone special, so stay open, curious and off your phone.
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The host's now wife cut her must-have list from 37 items to 5, shared it at a dinner, and two attendees said they had the guy.
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Hogi says to ask why you want each trait, since things like education level are often stand-ins for what you really want, such as intellectual connection.
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Rana now journals using The Book of Alchemy, doing a 100-day project where she writes for about five minutes on one word each day.
"Can I say I've been binge listening and binge watching all of Francesca's stuff and I love the meet cute mindset. And now when I leave my house, I'm intentional. I'm like, meet cute mindset, meet cute mindset."
▶ Play at 7:36"There's this book called The Book of Alchemy, which I love. Basically, you commit to doing one creative project for 100 days. And my project is to pick one word a day. Sometimes I just ask people to give me a word and I journal for about five minutes. And it's been quite heali..."
▶ Play at 16:13What they recommend · 2 picks
"Can I say I've been binge listening and binge watching all of Francesca's stuff and I love the meet cute mindset. And now when I leave my house, I'm intentional. I'm like, meet ..."
"There's this book called The Book of Alchemy, which I love. Basically, you commit to doing one creative project for 100 days. And my project is to pick one word a day. Sometimes..."
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