In case you didn’t see this comment at the bottom of the original post, here is the answer to my question on the coffee cup dashboard light:

Thank you all for the guesses, we do have a winning guess! Of course the winner is Kelli Rahn who drives a Mercedes and whose husband works for Mercedes! It is to indicate that the alertness monitor is on and the car will let you know if you veer out of the lane. Tuh-duh!