re: Action, an American cultural value
"Exploration is 'so passe' to the deconstructionist academic mentality that prevails in most Western cultures, even in the USA excepting American science."
What does this mean? What part of academia is relevant to exploration other than science? If you include a metaphorical sense, then the arts are at least as exploratory. I doubt that one could argue the Europeans push the cutting edge of science less than Americans, and certainly not that they don't push art to the limit.
Also, the Japanese are known for funding crazy science ideas, especially applied science.