 But the bootstrapping dogmatist will regard the circularity as virtuous. When the evidence is a mix of strong evidence and weak counterevidence, the stronger body of evidence exposes the weaker body as misleading evidence. Think of a jigsaw puzzle that has been polluted with stray pieces from another puzzle. When you manage to get a complete fit with a subset of the pieces, the remaining pieces are removed from view. Dimming the misleading evidence allows the leading evidence to shine more visibly. Therefore, we can indeed be more confident than we were before dismissing the weak evidence. Millikan was being responsible gatekeeper rather than a wishful thinker. Just as data should control theory, theory should control data.  The experimenter must strike a delicate balance between discounting too much contrary data and discounting too little. Proposed solutions to the dogmatism paradox have trouble sustaining this balance. 