I see that Shift-Up, Shift-Right, etc. allow me to select text from the keyboard (not requiring my mouse), but the main problem is that I cannot use other Emacs text navigation commands with a set mark in order to select text. In other words, I want to be able to highlight text to the end of the script (for example) by:
C-Space (set mark), M-> (goto end of script)
Rather than the MATLAB approach:
Shift + Ctrl + End
Having a separate "mark setting" function allows me to control text selection entirely from my keyboard without having to memorize or define new hotkeys (it's just C-Space + whatever text navigation commands I want to issue).