select
淘 centers on the act of selecting by washing or sifting, as in panning for gold or rinsing rice to separate the good from the unwanted.
淘 combines 氵 (water) with 匋, which likely contributes the sound トウ and relates to pottery or a container, suggesting washing or sifting materials in water.
Water 氵 on the left and 匋 (like a pot or container) on the right: imagine rinsing grains in a pot, swirling water to select and wash away impurities.
For トウ, picture a toe dipping into the water as you swirl the pot to select the good grains: toe -> トウ.
weeding out; elimination (e.g. of unneeded employees); culling; selection
personnel reduction
artificial selection
sexual selection
reorganizing an industry or enterprise and weeding out redundant workers; readjustment and retrenchment
to separate and discard; to sieve and sort; to wash out (impurities, etc.)
Taobao (Chinese online shopping platform)
sifting out; weeding out; selection; sorting
social selection
natural selection
kin selection
sexual selection