the use of "select" versus "selected"

I generally think of select examples as those examples that stood out above the rest or those examples are in some way "better" or more informative than the rest. Kind of like when a person says at a steakhouse, "And I want only your select cuts" (or something like that).

I think of selected examples as emphasizing that you or someone else personally selected them. It emphasizes in a subtle manner the work that you did in selecting them. I would say that "the selected examples" is the same as "the examples that I selected."

Will e-mail.

VRERSUS, TO MY KNOWLEDGE means against the direction of, the beauty of language is that there is no definite rules about the use of words

I would arrive to a logical conclusion and say "selected explanations" or "selected examples"

I would unhesitatingly go for "selected". Once upon a time "select" meant much the same thing but its meaning has drifted to "good in a snobbish way". In a sentence such as "Our hotel has a select clientele" there is no implication that the clientele have been chosen or selected; just that they are rich, well-bred, tasteful, etc. and wouldn't care to mix with the rest of us.