<I have not yet seen a single instance of a physical control like a button/lever/slider/knob/etc where people said "damn, I wish this was a featureless glass surface with buggy software on it".>
Apple tried REALLY HARD to make that fly, circa 2018-2022, with the Touchbar on the Macbook Pro. They finally gave up in 2023: almost nobody liked, wanted, or used the thing in place of the function key row they deleted to make room for it.
So I'd say your case is proven.