Reading Kelsey Johnson's book and watching the interviews with Jill Tarter and Avi Loeb raised one big question: How would the knowledge of intelligent extraterrestrial life change our meaning of authority, from economics to religion to science? Tarter discusses how if we recognize that we are not alone, it could drastically alter how we see ourselves on a universal scale. Loeb furthered this by pointing out the arrogance in assuming we're the most intelligent beings. Loeb emphasizes that communication with a more advanced civilization could cause our technologies and understanding of science to be irrelevant. If extraterrestrial life showed technological understandings beyond our own, long-standing human institutions might lose all validity.
What makes this question difficult to answer is that it is extremely hard to know how humans will react to any given situation. It is hard to predict if people will go out and lose all hope or if it will cause motivated individuals to further the human race. It is hard to predict if politicians, religious leaders, and scientists will use the news to motivate their fields or if they will consider it to be a roadblock. Additionally, would normal citizens even trust these authority figures anymore? If there is a more intelligent life, would people trust politicians, religious leaders, and scientists?