I fail to see how the argument is ridiculous; and I'll bet that a jury would find the idea that "there is a copy inside" at least reasonable, especially if you start with the premise that "the machine is not a human being."
What you're left with is a machine that produces "things that strongly resemble the original, that would not have been produced, had you not fed the original into the machine."
The fact that there's no "exact copy inside" the machine seems a lot like splitting hairs; like saying "Well, there's no paper inside the hard drive so the essence of what is copyable in a book can't be in it"
What you're left with is a machine that produces "things that strongly resemble the original, that would not have been produced, had you not fed the original into the machine."
The fact that there's no "exact copy inside" the machine seems a lot like splitting hairs; like saying "Well, there's no paper inside the hard drive so the essence of what is copyable in a book can't be in it"