[quakenul]

It gets tricky as soon as you need labels and/or more complicated visual feedback attached to "dumb" buttons.

The touchscreen is "lazy" in that it can defer thinking hard about your problem space and I can see why that alone would feel scary in a car.

On the other hand, there is only so much foresight you can have when you are innovating. Developing a Tesla might simply not be feasible without the flexibility a touchscreen gives you.