[NetOwl]

Those fall under the banner of token political topics.

If more non-scientific problems were mentioned, then the reporter probably didn't feel the need to mention them. Remember, this is just an article, not a transcript of all the talks given.

[babyface00]

"When he asked the audience of scientists to name the "most impossible problems facing us," they came up with: energy, water, selfishness, population, pollution, climate change, food, religion, wealth imbalance, health and war. "

Maybe the reporter's leaving something out, but he didn't say "name some...problems" he said "name the...problems".

It's not just religion and selfishness, its all of the problems:

energy - we've go enough to last centuries, if we could just get the envirowackos out of the way - hardly an impossible problem
water - it might be a problem longterm, but hardly insurmountable
population - debunked extensively
pollution - largely solved in the industrialized world
climate change - debunked extensively
wealth imbalance - only in communist/socialist countries
health - we're all living longer and healthier than ever in the history of mankind
war - what few, short wars we have are conducted with surgical precision to result in levels of peripheral damage unimaginable just short decades ago. Compare that to say the early and mid 20th century, or the early 19th century.

Most of these aren't even problems and certainly none are "impossible" I'd hate to fly in a plane these geniuses were responsible for designing. Maybe they should concentrate on figuring out where socks go in the dryer.