From Colonization, Technological and medical advancements, Space travel, Global wars, Enslavement and exploitation of the rest of the world.
Was it a purely lucky string of events that led to this? I've heard theories that it had something to do with longer harsher winters resulting in more time indoors and thus more exchanging of ideas and writing?
I'm looking for the most commonly and unbigoted or supremacist theory as to the rise of European Power.
Paul Kennedy writes a 28 page essay that answers this question briefly in the first chapter of his book "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers." Europe has a geography that features mountains and peninsulas that make it difficult for one nation to create a large empire that controls the entire continent. Europe, before 1945, always had around five powerful nations that competed with each other in a seemingly non stop series of wars. This set up a dynamic where the great powers would compete to gain economic and military breakthroughs that would enhance their own power. Europe as a whole would not ossify like the Moguls in India, Ming China or the Ottoman empire did, despite the fact all three looked far more powerful than any single European nation did in the year 1500 AD. Europeans were able to develop ocean going ships and were able to project their power through out the world.
There's a great answer to this question in the FAQ here.