sentences:  During the last century and a half the West has been the antithetical term in the dialectic, and as always it has been in that "other" that Japan has sought its own image, peering anxiously for signs of its own identity into the mirror of the rest of the world.After the challenge of Western technology has been successfully met, one wonders what will be left that is "alien," besides the very fact that the historically necessary "other" is lacking.In that case, "Japanese spirit" (Yamato-damashii) will find itself face to face with the most frightening "other" of all – its lack – at which point opposition must cease or else feed upon itself.