Data alone doesn’t have a voice. There is no substitute for theorizing and modeling.

From a letter by Steven Weinberg in the NYR of Books on Jan 16 2003:

…In an 1861 letter to a friend, Charles Darwin remarked,

About thirty years ago there was much talk that geologists ought only to observe and not theorize; and I well remember some  one saying that at this rate a man might as well go into a gravel pit and count the pebbles and describe all the colours. How odd it is that anyone should not see that all observation must be for or against some view if it is to be of any service!”