For a face that is not necessary

Taking as a preface and beginning reflection on the concepts of "necessity," "futility," "benefit," and "non-benefit," the cosmopolitan academic Nouchio Ordine embodies in this book, a book that does not shy away from describing itself as a "manifesto," as a sign of its combative spirit, a shirt of proof and guidance. He proposes to his readers a philosophical journey among the evidence of these concepts and their features, in the past and present, in philosophy and literature, in art and sciences, in the university and in the lovers' solitude. It concludes with the idea that "non-benefit"—meaning what we consider to be superfluous and of no benefit and unnecessary—is the salt of human experience from the beginning of history until today, and the condition of conditional freedom, warning of the consequences of what our world is proceeding with, under the titles of "benefit" and "profitability" and submission to "market judgments," from corruption of this salt and from narrowing the spaces of freedom and its avenues.