del
How would your propose for an alternate method, if one really did wish to select only the group container, and not its contents as well?
del
It is a good point. I definitely see the consistency problem. It is just that I always used it the opposite way, I guess. When I select a group and some documents, and say to edit the selection, I want just what I selected. I have been, in my head, thinking of the first three modes as almost entirely different than the fourth mode. I think weird though, I can see how having two different modes under the same button would be a bit misleading.
I wonder if something as simple as a menu divider between the top modes and the bottom ones would suffice to draw attention to the fact that something different will happen when using mode 4?
del
I disagree and think that the current implementation is the most intuitive (albeit not for Maria 
).
This is not true. If it were, I would agree that it would be inconsistent. But if you select two groups and hit “Edit Scrivenings”, only the text from those two groups will be displayed - not their contents.
The rule is really simple:
If a single document is selected that has no children, you can’t edit scrivenings.
If a single document is selected that has children, clicking on “Edit Scrivenings” will open that group and all of its descendants in E.S. Absolutely fundamental, this one - perfect for editing the whole of the draft. This option can be refined via the menu to allow you only to edit exportable or non-exportable documents - again, important if you only want to see what is actually going to go into your draft.
If more than one document is selected, regardless of whether it has children or not, E.S. will only show the selected documents.
The Edit Scrivenings menu lets you refine what happens when you have a group selected. Clicking on the toolbar icon will cause Scrivener to choose between “Edit Selection” or “Edit Content” depending on what is selected.
I thought this through and really think the current behaviour is perfectly sensible - and still do.