[javajosh]

>something that happened in the late 80s and 90s

There was a strong sense that AI was around the corner. Marvin Minsky gave our commencement address and expressed anger at us that we hadn't solved the problem of copying his consciousness onto a computer yet, and expressed the urgency that this problem be solved before he died (it was 2016 when he died, and we failed).

Goatishness was in the air, but it smelled like techno-optimism. Remember also that this was a brief, bright period between the fall of the Berlin wall but before 9/11 and well before climate change seemed all that serious, so we felt free to speak like this because it helped us convince ourselves and each other we were tackling big challenges so fearlessly we couldn't help but speak gibberish.