Dave,
Is there a functional advantage to having a gorgeous piece of wood compared to a plain piece of wood on your gun? Any functional advantage to world class engraving over laser etched? Any real functional advantage over plain twist barrels over 4 iron Turkish British best damascus? No. I guess certain aspects of the gunmakers art have no fuctional advantage at all. The art is a statement, a statement that the gun you are using is a quality instrument, that many hours of extremely valuable, highly skilled time and labor went into the manufacture of that instrument.
If the inletting of the locks is of high quality...then wouldn't the heading up of the stock be just as high quality? If the stocker spent that much time inletting the locks, he more than likely spent that much time heading up the stock, getting the measurements right, inletting the trigger guard, top strap, getting the shape of the stock correct. etc. You know that it was done right.
I guess it could be said that there actually IS a functional advantage of knowing it was done right. Piece of mind is extremely functional.

So, silk skivvies and all, enjoy your guns boys. And for what its worth, I can't afford the work that I pictured, I have never spent more than $2500 on a re-stock. I was just saying...there are differences, I'm not above pointing them out and knowing I pay for what I get.

Dustin