In 2002, American paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould paid a surprising tribute to Nietzsche’s evolutionism. I explain this critical affinity, which Daniel Dennett had already pointed out in 1995, focusing on three aspects. First, I show how it allows Gould to dispense with the dualistic separation between natural sciences and humanities and social sciences, in which Dennett tries to confine him. Second, I explain how it allows for promising and unsuspected ways to re-examine Nietzsche’s Will to Power hypothesis. Finally, I argue that it provides solid grounds for Nietzsche’s criticism of Darwinism.