Superzooms: why so many pixels?

I am about to buy another bridge camera, mainly for birding, and the Finepix HS35/50 EXR look pretty good. Their combination of extreme zoom, reasonable price and slightly larger sensor seems to lead the field at the moment.

I'm wondering about the 16MP choice, though. I haven't found extra value in anything above 12MP, even for publishing full-size calendar photos. And I haven't yet found a point-and-shoot with >7X zoom range whose optics (in my hands) would resolve a high-contrast line so sharply that is aliased in the raw image. So the extra pixel count seems to me like a negative: higher noise/worse low-light performance, plus larger file sizes on-chip.

Could someone here please explain what I'm missing? Or is it just marketing specsmanship?

Suggestions for other good P&S cameras with zoom at least 20x and sensor >1/2.3" appreciated. APS-C, 12MP, 20X zoom - wonder how long before someone makes my dream camera? And how much it would cost and weigh?