There is analyzed the issue of sociocultural foundations of scientific knowledge. There is shown that the reason for cognitive success of science is determined by the fact that it is based on both formal and informal constructions, the latest originate in the wealth of the world culture.

There is shown that the traditional approach to considering the structure of the theoretical knowledge in the context of two-level model does not make it possible to represent adequately the correlation of its formalized and non-formalized contents. With the purpose to overcome the mentioned drawback, there is suggested the alternative approach on the basis of the notions of complementarity of the formalized and nonformalized contents of the theoretical knowledge.