I believe the most important purpose of the PSK is as an aid to focus your mind on survival situations. It achieves its optimal utility at the moment you assemble it and thereafter serves a primarily symbolic function.

This discussion reminds me of my high school Latin class -- most everyone hated the weekly grammar tests and it was standard procedure to write out a little cheat sheet with the appropriate words and conjugations. I discovered after a while that in the process of deciding what the important information to include on this cheat sheet and then the careful writing of it on a tiny sheet of paper -- I no longer needed the physical paper because it had by then been stored in my memory.

Survival is surely a state of mind more than any little tin of odds and sods. Onboard skills beat outboard tools. (Of course, a mini Bic lighter and a knife sure speed things up...)