He was professor of philosophy and ethics at the University of Humanistics in Utrecht (1989–2004) and from 1996 to 2000 also rector of this institution. From 2004-2014 he was co-founder and director of the Kosmopolis Institute.

His philosophical work has two focal points: ethics of care for people and the earth and political ethics, in particular being a (world) citizen as an inhabitant of the earth.

‘The earth is sick and that disease is called man’. This diagnosis was made by Friedrich Nietzsche some 150 years ago. The worst disease of modern man is his alienation from the nature around him and from the earth.

Nietzsche seeks the remedy in a way of philosophizing in which Man is no longer central, but the Earth and the way in which we could inhabit and work on the earth. Nietzsche’s call to develop a terrasophie, a new wisdom about life on earth, has so far remained underexposed. This book aims to fill this gap. It closely follows Nietzsche on his personal quest.

Henk Manschot makes a well-argued plea to take Nietzsche’s motto ‘Stay faithful to the earth’ as ​​a guideline for a contemporary ecological art of living that includes both a personal assignment and a social orientation for the future.