This is the short edition of Morales, first broadcast on the BBC World Service.

Thank you for downloading from the BBC.

The details of our complete range of podcasts and our terms of use

go to BBCWorldService.com slash podcasts.

Hello, welcome to another edition of More or Less on the BBC World Service.

I'm Wesley Stevenson.

Now this week, some comments made by the Pope got us thinking.

He was reported to say that the number of pedophiles among the Catholic clergy was around 2%.

And unsurprisingly, this has caused a bit of a storm.

The revelation was made in a somewhat disputed interview with an Italian newspaper

but was reported worldwide with a sense of shock.

But the thing that we were wondering was, is 2% a big number?

I mean, obviously life would be better if none of the Catholic clergy were pedophiles

but how does the 2% figure compare to the population at large?

One man who studies this kind of thing is Dr. James Canter.

He's a psychologist and sexual behaviour scientist at the University of Toronto.

But he says it's a difficult question to answer.

2% is a probably reasonable guess for the number of pedophiles in society in general.

Because pedophilia is so secretive and that so few people are willing to admit it,

there really is no meaningful way to get a reliable estimate.

There's no way to conduct a survey.

There's no meaningfully ethical way of taking pick a number.

...