WORLD NEWS - The publisher and founder of the world renowned Skeptic magazine and The Skeptics Society, Dr Michael Shermer, has been appointed to the newly formed UAP Science Advisory Council. 

UAP stands for "unidentified anomalous phenomena", commonly referred to as "unidentified flying objects" or UFOs.

The council was formed at the request of the White House in coordination with the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the FBI and other agencies.

It will be led by Dr Avi Loeb, a Harvard theoretical physicist, and the 11 members are tasked to investigate and get to the bottom of the recently released UAP files. 

The UAP files comprise a massive batch of declassified US government records regarding UAPs.

Initiated by the Trump administration, multiple government branches, including the Pentagon, CIA, FBI, and NASA, are declassifying and publicly publishing decades of previously sealed records, military footage and eyewitness testimonies.

Recent file drops heavily feature reports and footage of glowing, red or spherical objects. Unlike older military releases, many recent videos were captured by civilians and law enforcement using smartphones.

The publicly archived data can be viewed on the official PURSUE website, that stands for the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters.

A statement released by skeptic.com, says the UAP Science Advisory Council brings together experts from a wide range of disciplines, including astrophysics, oceanography, molecular biology, anthropology, psychology, artificial intelligence and instrumentation, to provide scientific guidance on the study of UAP.

Shermer will contribute his decades of experience in scientific skepticism, anomaly investigation and public communication. 

As founder and publisher of Skeptic magazine, Shermer has long advocated for careful, evidence-based inquiry into extraordinary claims and the importance of applying critical thinking and rigorous methodology to unresolved phenomena.

Publisher and founder of Skeptic magazine and The Skeptics Society, Dr Michael Shermer

“Science advances by investigating anomalies with curiosity, skepticism and methodological rigor,” says Shermer. “I am honoured to serve alongside such an accomplished group of scientists and scholars in helping ensure that questions surrounding UAP are approached with the highest standards of scientific inquiry.”

In a post on X, Shermer says Loeb is the right person to head the UAP Science Advisory Council because "he strikes the right balance between naive gullibility and dogmatic skepticism as Carl Sagan noted in the epigram of my first book, Why People Believe Weird Things".

The epigram of Dr Michael Shermer's first book, Why People Believe Weird Things.

The two brilliant men hold a standing wager. Shermer bets that claims of extraterrestrial contact or techno signatures are greatly exaggerated, while Loeb bets that we will find direct evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence. 

Founded in 1992, Skeptic magazine and The Skeptics Society are dedicated to promoting science, reason and critical thinking through publishing, education, original research and public outreach.

The members of the UAP Council are:

• Dr Richard Cloete - Galileo Project postdoctoral fellow trained at the University of Cambridge, specializing in AI-driven data analysis tools, appointed to the council to lead data analysis and AI methodology.
• Dr Tim Gallaudet - oceanographer and former Acting NOAA Administrator and Rear Admiral, contributing oceanographic expertise to the council's analysis of maritime UAP encounters.
• Dr Devesh Nandal - researcher in numerical analysis and astrophysics, recruited to apply computational modeling techniques to UAP phenomena.
• Prof Garry Nolan - Stanford pathology professor and molecular biologist, co-founder of the Sol Foundation, bringing expertise in molecular biology and materials science to anomaly investigations.
• Dr Omer Eldadi - specialist combining data management, AI, and human psychology, appointed to handle the council’s data infrastructure and the human-factors side of UAP reporting.
• Dr Avi Loeb - Harvard theoretical physicist, founder of the Galileo Project, former chair of Harvard’s astronomy department, and bestselling author of Extraterrestrial.
• Dr Regina Sarmiento - Galileo Project researcher whose work focuses on AI-assisted data analysis and management, joining the council to apply machine-learning techniques to UAP data.
• Dr. Michael Shermer - founder and publisher of Skeptic magazine, longtime science communicator known for applying critical-thinking and anomaly-investigation methods, including a public wager with Avi Loeb over alien-technology disclosure.
• Prof Peter Skafish - cultural anthropologist and co-founder of the Sol Foundation with a PhD from UC Berkeley, author of Rough Metaphysics, bringing an anthropological lens to how humans might interpret nonhuman intelligence.
• Prof Matthew Szydagis - physicist specialising in instrumentation and detector technology, appointed to lead instrumentation and data-collection methods for the council.
• Dr Jennice Vilhauer - psychologist, developer of Future Directed Therapy and author of Think Forward to Thrive, joining to study the psychological impact of potential disclosure on the public.

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