The facts never just speak for themselves. When Louis and Mary Leakey went to Africa in search of our hominid ancestors, they did so not because of any existing data but because of Darwin's theory of human descent and his argument that we are obviously closely related to the great apes. Because the great apes live in Africa, it is there that the fossil remains of our forebears would most likely be found. In other words, the Leakeys went to Africa because of a concept, not a percept. The data followed and confirmed this theory, the very opposite of how we usually think science works.
Science is an exquisite blend of data and theory, facts and hypotheses, observations and views.
We are, after all, humans, not gods. Later, professional philosophers and historians took over and, in a paroxysm of postmodern deconstruction, proffered a view of science as a relativistic game played by European white males who, in a reductionistic frenzy of hermeneutical hegemony, were hell-bent on suppressing the masses beneath the thumb of dialectical scientism and technocracy. Thankfully, intellectual trends, like social movements, have a tendency to push both ends to the middle, and these two extremist views of science are now largely pass . Yet science does progress, and some views really are superior to others, regardless of the color, gender or country of origin of the scientist holding that view. If you don't catch the flaws in your theory, the slant in your bias or the distortion in your preferences, someone else will.