It's a bit of a function of time, place, traffic volume and weather conditions as to whether certain speeds would be appropriate as opposed to legal.
At rush hour on a congested motorway not only would it be quite difficult to maintain a high speed, it would also be genuinely dangerous whereas at 4.00 on a summers morning on an empty stretch of motorway 70 feels inappropriately slow.
The line of least resistance is to have a lowest common denominator limit sadly. An experienced, thinking driver can work out for themselves what is safe but there will always be plenty who can't or won't.
Not sure what the right answer is to be honest. If people could be trusted to make the right judgements there would no need for limits at all.
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