From Wikipedia
Human societies are characterized by patterns of relationships between individuals sharing a distinctive culture and institutions. Without an article, the term refers either to the entirety of humanity or a contextually specific subset of people.
I would restate one part of the original question as
'"society" (without "the") refers to human society in general'
and, the example should read
"socialization is the process of learning to live in society"
The phrase "the society" is used in areas of study such as anthropology, political science and sociology when referring to specific groups.
Again from the Wikipedia article, discussing a particular group
This nobility organized warriors to protect the society from invasion.
In this case, "the society" is used to limit the scope to the group under discussion, and not all of humanity.
Edited to respond to OP's edit of original question
In "Soldiers protect society" the lack of an article preceding "society" makes it a statement about human society in general. As such it can stand alone without other context.
"Soldiers protect the society" seems taken out of context. It begs the question which society?
(Note: The following example statements are not meant to be historically accurate.)
In general, soldiers protect (human) society.
In ancient Rome, soldiers called centurions protected the (Roman) society.
In ancient Japan, soldiers called samurai protected the (Japanese) society.
Select means to carefully choose; it also means to use a mouse or keystrokes to mark something on a computer screen.
In both the cases, the number of things chosen or marked does not influence which verb is used.
Best Answer
I doubt OP's cited speaker "literally" enjoys making a/the effort to do home baking. More likely she enjoys the process of baking (disregarding the "effort"), and/or the subsequent eating or offering to others of the fruits of her labours.
This kind of "loose" phrasing is quite normal in English, and most Anglophones would say my observation is pedantic / over-exacting. I only make the point because to speakers of some other languages, the phrasing may seem odd.
Having said all that, I think a slightly different example sentence better shows how different articles can affect meaning...
Many if not most native speakers would agree it's unambiguous that that the speaker in #1 does in fact clean his teeth twice daily - but that's not true for #2 (where although the speaker tries to achieve his goal, it's implied that he's not always successful). Bear in mind this is quite a fine difference, that won't always be either intended by a speaker, or understood by his audience.
I could perhaps justify this difference on the grounds that #1 refers to a specific amount of effort (the amount needed to achieve the goal), whereas #2 simply implies some effort (but possibly not enough to succeed).