Xenocide (Ender's Saga #3)

by Orson Scott Card

“We human beings are no different. It may not be a virus, but we still spend most of our time acting out our genetic destiny. Take the differences between males and females. Males naturally tend toward a broadcast strategy of reproduction. Since males make an almost infinite supply of sperm and it costs them nothing to deploy it—” “Not nothing,” said Ender. “Nothing,” said Valentine, “just to deploy it. Their most sensible reproductive strategy is to deposit it in every available female—and to make special efforts to deposit it in the healthiest females, the ones most likely to bring their offspring to adulthood. A male does best, reproductively, if he wanders and copulates as widely as possible.” “I’ve done the wandering,” said Ender. “Somehow I missed out on the copulating.” “I’m speaking of overall trends,” said Valentine. “There are always strange individuals who don’t follow the norms. The female strategy is just the opposite, Planter. Instead of millions and millions of sperm, they only have one egg a month, and each child represents an enormous investment of effort. So females need stability. They need to be sure there’ll always be plenty of food. We also spend large amounts of time relatively helpless, unable to find or gather food. Far from being wanderers, we females need to establish and stay. If we can’t get that, then our next best strategy is to mate with the strongest and healthiest possible males. But best of all is to get a strong healthy male who’ll stay ...