These are dampers, acting as reserve tank that provides some air on piston intake strokes and replenishes in between strokes, the idea being to have a steadier flow in the duct rather than a pulsed flow with each piston intake helps making a larger average flow possible because a pulsed flow has times of low flows, and times of higher flow but higher flows are proportionnally more hampered by duct friction than low flows: double the flow, and the pressure loss increases about 6 times...
IN addition, this steadier condition helps the MAF make a better measurement hence , theoretically, a more accurate fuel air mixture.
soooo...keeping the dampers is more help than a nuisance,... .speaking of fluids dynamics of course....
..in other makes of cars, they use honeycomb structures to favor laminar flow .. that is, equally distributed flow across the section of the duct, rather than turbulent flow, for about the same purpose.