Then the collectioneur at heart... just collecting things they really appreciate and by buying giving things a value... Could be discussed, but by bidding and buying they set a standard for certain objects ... This also makes other pieces more valuable. Some people collecting stuff really appreciate it and they are happy with owning it and owning piece of that history. It's charming some people just are so interested that they wanna hold such specific things...
For me its the same like people owning cars, not to drive but collect, or wines not to drink but collect those are things that can be used for consumption or fun. Not like that paper or Einstein paper or paintings... But still those things also are being bought not for what they can use it for or for its purpose but just for collecting.
We can always discuss either if its worth it or would we yes/no pay such money if we would own that kind of money etc, but people is people and everyone is different, I wouldn't pay for it, but I can appreciate those things happening and be able to think about it, putting it in perspective.
people could actually buy collections for the sake of collecting, perhaps out of admiration, but there are those that buy for the sake of saving their money through collections, you see them buy many of these collections stack them for the future rather than having those money sitting in bank accounts where eyes could easily notice their networth. This is just how some of these wealthy people could choose to store their wealth against the future and they can always sell any whenever they have a demand for bulksum of money and the chances are that the could sell at a price 2x of what they bought it.