By Tim Binnall
An enlightening new survey from Russia provides rare insights into what residents of the country think about aliens. The rather expansive study reportedly polled a staggering 116,000 people about the hotly debated topic. Among the revealing findings from the survey were that a whopping 79% of the participants expressed a belief in the existence of aliens, while 21 percent responded negatively to such a scenario. Meanwhile, a mere 10% expressed the opinion that the Russian government is hiding the truth about extraterrestrials, which is a remarkable contrast to America, where such a conspiratorial concept is far more widely believed.
As for what it would take for a survey participant to believe that ETs are real, 49% of the Russian public indicated that they would "need to see aliens with their own eyes" for such a fantastic scenario to be confirmed. Below that, twenty percent said that they would trust the word of a respected scientist and 12% would be satisfied with video proof. Shockingly, only 10% of the people said that they would believe President Putin if he revealed that aliens are real.
But what of the ETs themselves? Are they friend or foe? The Russian respondents were split on this question with 24% suggesting they would be hostile to humans and 23% opining that they would come in peace. Contrasting with the idea that aliens know of our existence and choose not to present themselves to the planet, perhaps the most peculiar insight from the survey is that 53% of the Russian participants mused that ETs are actually unaware of humans and that both civilizations would be equally surprised if or when our two species ever cross paths.