The Times' thoughtful columnist James Marriott writes - and hopes, I think - that he can imagine a time when social status, rather than bans, will get people off their smartphones.

"Economically at least, smartphone dependency is a sign of low status," he writes - and because humans are finely attuned to the nuances of how people think of us, often considering it more than our health, it will be stigma, being perceived as having to be on one's phone, that gets one off it.

Having a smartphone used to be a sign of prestige, but now everyone has one or is issued something that's a lot like one for the most menial of tasks.

"The higher you are in the economic hierarchy," writes Marriott, "the less likely you are to be fired if you don't leap into action at the prompting of an app."

Are there lessons here for motoring, I wonder? The world of cars is shifting, slowly and slightly, away from heavy screen dependency. But maybe it's perceived status that will tip the balance.

Certainly the novelty of having a big screen in a car has worn off, and while it wasn't always the most prestigious of cars that were fitted with them in the first place, they were thought of as clever. I still remember the first car I tested that was fitted with satellite navigation. In the late 1990s, I think; a Mitsubishi Carisma, for sure. I drove my housemates into London because of the thrill of it. BMW's early iDrive screens - not very easily controlled, granted - caused a stir, too, and Tesla, then Volvo, really popularised them.

That the most luxurious car makers didn't lead the way with big touchscreens is perhaps more down to budget than desire. Mainstream cars have bigger development budgets than niche sports or luxury cars. In the early screen days, Aston Martin was buying systems from Volvo, and Rolls-Royce is still refacing BMW systems (while making sure they're appropriate for its cars' longer lifespans).

But even in those early days, Rolls-Royce and Bentley, to the credit of both, began to see what I think most of us do now: that the ability to be switched off from tech, and from the hectic wider world, is a luxury in itself. A Bentley or a Rolls can hide its screens, because its maker realised its customers want it that way and prefer interacting with real controls, like the organ stops that modulate air through the (metal, gently manoeuvrable) vents. These mechanical systems are cheaper to develop but expensive to make - and feel it.

No screen can replicate that tactility, regardless of how nice the graphics are and especially not now that screens are everywhere. At a certain resolution, there's no way for a prestige manufacturer's screen to look better than anyone else's. Whose looks better, BYD's or BMW's? Honestly couldn't tell you. Could barely care less, in the same way that I don't know which restaurant has the best app for ordering at the table. At the Butchers Arms, I get a conversation from someone who knows what's on, off or particularly nice today. It's added value.

The difficulty car makers face, though, is that nearly all new cars need to have some kind of screen. There's now just too much mandatory technology, too much customer expectation on equipment and too many financial pressures on any series-production car to avoid them. A mainstream manufacturer would have to design, engineer and produce perhaps dozens of different interiors, instead of buying one screen and programming each with a few differing lines of code, to make it feasible. And perhaps it would result in button overload.

Still, there's a trend at the very top of the market to move away from screen overdose. The Bugatti Tourbillon's instrument cluster is to be made by Swiss watchmakers. The new Ferrari Luce attempts to disguise its digital instrument pack behind a real speedo needle and several layers of glass. And if that trickles down, it is, as perhaps with smartphones, luxury and status that will save us from death by screen. 'Yes, my car has dials and buttons, and not just because I wanted them, but because I could afford them.'