In the Peter Watts novels I've been reading, characters occasionally use phrases such as "r-selector" or "K-selector," and I could never figure out quite what the author was trying to say when those phrases were used to describe other characters. But then I ran across this nice little bit:

"Typically, r-selected species produce many offspring, each of which is unlikely to survive to adulthood, while K-selected species invest more heavily in fewer offspring, each of which has a better chance of surviving to adulthood."

So I would take that (along with running off remembered contexts in the narrative) to mean that someone referred to as an r-selector would be of a more promiscuous bent, ie, they might not be looking to actually have a lot of babies, but there behavior of sleeping with a lot of people might seem as such. Whereas a K-selector would be someone of a more monogamous, relationship-focused bent. Or, from a different angle, someone of a particular religious background that encourages mass production of younglings might be considered an r-selector as well.

Either way, it's an interesting way of looking at the people around oneself, all of a sudden from a more...ecological perspective. Kind of a reminder of humans still being animals, as it were. Also, it would be funny to say "r's and K's" instead of "ladies and gentlemen," as it would eliminate gender from that equation and speak to a different level of thought. And be kind of sardonically funny.

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