Science is the greatest asset of human culture. For many millennia, people lived in the darkness of false ideas about the world. They owe their movement towards the light of true ideas about it primarily to science. When did it arise? What are the sources of its development? What does the modern scientific picture of the world look like? In this book, the author tries to answer these questions and many others, relying on the philosophy of universal evolution and illuminating the path to the creation of a synthetic theory of scientific evolution. Written in a popular science form, this book will be of interest to a wide range of readers. It will be especially useful for graduate students preparing for an exam in the philosophy of science.