0 What is scientific literacy?

I'll fling this open for comment, and hold mine for later so as to not steer things too much. What is scientific literacy? There's enough talk publicly about there not being enough scientific literacy around, and I tend to agree, but I've noticed that it's pretty rare for anybody to say just what they mean by the term. Maybe I wouldn't agree if I knew what they meant.

What are your thoughts on what scientific literacy is? And how important (please compare it to something else, not just 'very', or 'hardly at all') do you think it is for modern societies to be scientifically literate?