ABSTRACT
IF the chief task of science be the forecasting of the future on the basis of the laws of the past and present, then Karl Marx was in fact the first man in the course of all human history to create, on the foundation of the world outlook of dialectical materialism worked out by him, an absolutely new science which is characterised by its ability to foresee the ways of future historical development. A science which has not yet reached this stage in its development is still on the level of pre-scientific knowledge. This most essential peculiarity of developed science defines its practical importance, the part it plays in men's social life. Science gives men vision, lifts the curtain of the future before them and allows them to act consciously in a definite direction.
