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Public Policy Polling reported in an an opinion poll that:

4% of voters say they believe “lizard people” control our societies by gaining political power

Lizard people are also known as reptilians.

Is that (and other results) from this poll reliable?

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  • What evidence would take to convince you? Considering that Public Policy Polling is reputable and their poll can be considered as a reference.
    – George Chalhoub
    May 7, 2015 at 5:10
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    There is actually a claim (made at least in my statistics classes in university 15 years ago) that there are about 5% of people in every survey that agree with any claim not matter how outlandish. If that's true 4% for lizard people is well within the expected margin.
    – user21930
    May 7, 2015 at 6:54
  • @EikePierstorff: true, though you can eliminate that via having same question twice with different phrasing, where answering "yes" to both would be self contradictory and eliminated from results. I don't think they've done that here though.
    – vartec
    May 12, 2015 at 17:23
  • @EikePierstorff 95% of people agree with you on that.
    – LegionMammal978
    Nov 23, 2015 at 17:26

1 Answer 1

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Results from this poll seem to be reliable. Public Policy Polling (PPP) who is a U.S. polling firm based in Raleigh, North Carolina released a PDF report listing the results of a national survey looking at common conspiracy theories.

The exact question:

Do you believe that shape-shifting reptilian people control our world by taking on human form and gaining political power to manipulate our societies, or not?

Answers:

Do: 4%
Do not: 88%
Not sure: 7%

The wire.com took the findings and arranged them from most-to least-believed:

Conspiracy Percent believing Number of Americans believing
JFK was killed by conspiracy   51 percent 160,096,160
Bush intentionally misled on Iraq WMDs 44 percent 138,122,178
Global warming is a hoax 37 percent 116,148,195
Aliens exist 29 percent 91,035,072
New World Order 28 percent 87,895,931
Hussein was involved in 9/11 28 percent 87,895,931
A UFO crashed at Roswell 21 percent 65,921,948
Vaccines are linked to autism 20 percent 62,782,808
The government controls minds with TV 15 percent 47,087,106
Medical industry invents diseases 15 percent 47,087,106
CIA developed crack 14 percent 43,947,966
Bigfoot exists 14 percent 43,947,966
Obama is the Antichrist 13 percent 40,808,825
The government allowed 9/11 11 percent 34,530,544
Fluoride is dangerous 9 percent 28,252,264
The moon landing was faked 7 percent 21,973,983
Bin Laden is alive 6 percent 18,834,842
Airplane contrails are sinister chemicals 5 percent 15,695,702
McCartney died in 1966 5 percent 15,695,702
Lizard people control politics 4 percent 12,556,562

The PDF report also mentioned that isurveyed 1,247 registered voters and has a margin of error of 2.8 percent:

PPP surveyed 1,247 registered American voters from March 27th to 30th. The margin of error for the overall sample is +/-2.8%. This poll was not paid for or authorized by any campaign or political organization. PPP surveys are conducted through automated telephone interviews.

As for Public Policy Polling (PPP), it can be considered as accurate since a Fordham University report released ranked the firm first among 28 organizations for the accuracy of its final, national estimates. It also a great track record and history in being accurate.

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    Hmm, I wonder, would Bush intentionally misled on Iraq WMDs actually be considered a conspiracy theory of the same caliber given the amount of information pointing to large scale deception that led up to that? The rest on the list don't have much in the way of reliable evidence, and they are generally viewed high on the "crackpot index".
    – JasonR
    May 7, 2015 at 13:43
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    Man, those reduced labels for the different conspiracies are strange. I mean, Aliens almost certainly exist somewhere and A UFO absolutely crashed at Roswell, it was probably a balloon, but it still was unidentified, flying and an object. It isn't expressly related but I'd like to see the actual questions for some of the more oddly worded items in the conspiracy list.
    – DampeS8N
    May 7, 2015 at 14:07
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    I'm a little worried now. I am one of the 9 percent in the fluoride is dangerous camp. Am I a loon?
    – Lumberjack
    May 7, 2015 at 20:10
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    And 70% believe there's a dude up in space who made everything with magic...
    – George Chalhoub
    May 7, 2015 at 20:15
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    @Lumberjack I suppose there's a line between believing that flouride is bad for health, and believing that the government puts flouride in public water and toothpaste because they know it's bad for health. The latter is definitely a conspiracy theory.
    – Stuntddude
    Nov 15, 2015 at 3:20

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