Highlight a word
click the go to previous document button
click the go to next document button
4 press the delete key.
RESULT: The word is deleted
Highlight a word
click the show last document viewed button
click the show next document viewed button
4 press the delete key.
RESULT: The word is NOT deleted
Consider not leaving the highlighting in place. Sometimes I come back to a document after months, and I see text still highlighted.
Yeah, there is a problem with history. It looks like it steals focus from the editor when used either by clicking or via the shortcut key. If one is typing in the editor, they should be able to quickly go back to check something and then return to editing without any friction. I’ll make sure it is on the list.
As for just not remembering the selection, that’s an intended feature of the software. It does take some getting used to, but I think the program would feel very clumsy without it. You wouldn’t be able to easily cross-reference, one of Scrivener’s strengths, if the software lost your place in the text editor every time you looked something up. You’d have to go out of your way to avoid that happening, and that’s not the type of thing you want people to be thinking about while they are working and thinking about other things.
Within one session, sure. Weeks later, surely not. Hence our Wish List request to be able to toggle this behavior, or to time it out.
Time limit on selection highlighting and pointer within doc?
Long-lived selections and pointers make the most sense for those who use Scrivener primarily to write. But a minority of us use it primarily to store, retrieve, locate and navigate. A selection toggle would be especially helpful to this second group.
Well, I wouldn’t paint it so cut and dry as you have. I use Scrivener to store, locate and work with notes and data, as well as to write, and I for one have never been bothered by the fact that it remembers where I was reading/working/filing/whatever—weeks, yes months, and even years later. I in fact have always very much liked that it does that, and find it a dependable way to mark my place for the future. Besides, if I really don’t need to be where I was when I last looked at the section it is easy to ignore it: Ctrl-Home / Cmd-Up.
Not to say I haven’t already filed your request, I did so back when you posted it. If Keith thinks it is okay to add, then we’ll do so. I could use a “wipe” in a few contexts myself—the tutorial project for one. 
I always have to go through and make sure each document is set to the top. But whether that needs to be a feature is something for Keith to decide.