STANDING UP TO JAPAN

True, we could learn things from the Japanese about being less spendthrift, less self-indulgent, more careful about quality. Still, there’s much in the American world view that bodes well in the long run. Our tolerance, our passion for newness and diversity, our willingness to take criticism and readiness for self-renewal: These will serve us at least as well as homogeneity and discipline serve the Japanese.

In the early 1950s, we almost responded to the threat of communism by adopting our enemy’s methods--creating a closed, paranoid society. Instead, we chose to keep faith with our nature. Today we see a Soviet Union that is, in effect, surrendering to our way of looking at things.

No. The solution isn’t to learn how to make better VCRs or TVs than Tokyo. The answer is to let them make those things if they’re good at it. Let’s go do things we are intrinsically better at.

DAVID BRIN

Los Angeles