“People may believe it": UFO researcher responds to viral claim about aliens revealing themselves

UFO researcher and Harvard professor Avi Loeb reportedly addressed the viral claim about aliens revealing themselves in 16 days and clarified that he never gave such a statement. According to News Nation, a media outlet gained attention online after claiming that Avi Loeb predicted aliens would show themselves within sixteen days.

Loeb appeared on News Nation's Jesse Weber Live and warned that the risk of spreading such a false claim is that some people might actually believe it. He said the danger in posting this kind of lie can mislead the public and create false impressions. Loeb said,

"Some people may believe it."

About the false claim published, he stated:

"It’s obvious that there are people who want to get attention ascribing things that I don’t say. In this case, they wanted to get clickbait. They did get it."

Last year, Loeb gained significant attention when he suggested that comet 3I/ATLAS might have an alien origin because of its unusual signals. Although Loeb had remained open to exploring certain UAP theories, he emphasized that science must be the final authority in determining whether humanity is alone in the universe.

Continue reading more about the story.

UFO updates: Avi Loeb addressed online rumor over alien revelation within 16 days

Professor Avi Loeb

@ProfAviLoeb

The claim made in this post is false and does not accurately represent my views or scientific work. The search for signs of extraterrestrial technological civilizations is a serious scientific endeavor. It deserves to be discussed with intellectual honesty, scientific rigor, and

In early October 2026, several pop culture and sports accounts on social media misrepresented Loeb's real comments about alien revelation and sparked an online frenzy by claiming that he predicted aliens would arrive in just 16 days.

Loeb spoke to News Nation to dismiss the rumor and explained that some people were trying to gain attention by claiming such false statements. They just wanted clickbait, and they achieved it.

The viral claim distorted an actual formal bet Loeb had made. According to Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE, the UFO expert has consistently maintained a public bet that alien life will be discovered or revealed by December 31, 2030.

In 2025, the Skeptic magazine reported that the American historian of science Dr. Michael Shermer had placed a $1,000 bet against Loeb that extraterrestrial visitation, technology, or biological life would not be confirmed before December 31. The Trump administration even examined a large archive of UAP records in the United States.

The wager was officially registered with the Long Now Foundation's Long Bets program. The $1,000 stake would be awarded to the Galileo Project Foundation, no matter which participant wins.

Will there be any aliens according to Michael Shermer's bet?

The announcement about the bet came three months before Donald Trump directed US agencies to identify and release government files related to UFOs, UAPs, and extraterrestrial life in February 2026. The International Business Times reported that 6 sets of records had already been made public under this program.

The disclosed material had infrared readings, FBI and NASA files, intelligence and military reports, audio and video recordings, and artistic renderings. Sources revealed that the database had 155,000 unique UAP‑related pages from seven countries, but none of the documents had any clear proof about UAP or UFOs.

Shermer’s wager was more exact than the headline version suggested. It didn't deny the possibility of life elsewhere. Instead, it predicted that by the end of 2030, at least two of three named scientific organizations would not confirm the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence in the specific forms outlined by the bet.

Read more: A UFO expert claimed certain anomalies on the Moon could be connected to unexplained NASA recordings.

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