As opposed to non-data science, where they just make things up out of thin air? I think what you're trying to say is that "data science", as a field, is able to

As opposed to non-data science, where they just make things up out of thin air? I think what you're trying to say is that "data science", as a field, is able to be much more productive these days because of an increased availability of pre-processed data. I'd completely agree! Unfortunately the author's statement does not reflect that idea at all (though I'd be lying if I said I understood what they were trying to get at). At the end of the day all science deals with data, and most data is, primarily speaking, of finite quantity, so I'm not exactly sure what leverage is being described here...