If you have just as many controls, you're faced with the same amount of mental space, and when that mental space no longer corresponds to physical space, seems like it just gets more difficult.

Those cockpits look intimidating to people who haven't been trained to fly those planes. But here's the thing, non-pilots can't fly glass cockpit planes either. The complexity is unavoidable.

To a certain level this is true and important when dealing with situations where someone making the wrong decision can have dire consequences. The comparison breaks down though when the added complexity only serves to increase the amount of control over processes which are meant to be accessible to casual users and experts alike, e.g. an audio-producing device offering a simple volume control to the casual user with an option to access a multi-band parametric equalizer to those who want or need to have more control over the device.