I think that what Gunflint Charlie says about "intrinsic value" is true in our everyday market-driven world. In a survival world (as much of the world still is), there IS intrinsic value, for example the machete that will break when you need to fell a tree HAS less intrinsic value than the one that won't. Hopefully none of us will find ourselves in a situation where we have to judge our guns like that. But we might.