ROFL! Everyone is so quick to make knee-jerk bad faith rebuttals
Ha! That's fair, I really wasn't taking you seriously because the robot arm analogy was a terrible fit. Maybe AI can help you come up with a better analogy :P
You're right though that simply punching a sentence into a computer isn't art. In the same way that a writer curates the words they use and refines their writing over time, a txt2img chat prompt is also refined over time by the prompter, and real-world skill and experience with photography or painting or whatever other media allows the prompter to create an extremely refined prompt very quickly.
Does this photographer, crafting a prompt based on his decades of photography experience, not do exactly what you are saying isn't art? And in so doing created an image that won an art competition against real photographs taken of and by real humans?
Frankly, I'm sick of the gatekeeping. Anyone claiming they know what makes art clearly doesn't, it's always accompanied by some forced and narrow interpretation of what art is and what is art. Give a shitty prompt, get a shitty image. Describe the technical details of what you want and that's what you'll get. Technical details, like focal length and ISO strength and so on, == subject matter knowledge, meaning the person has the skill already, so it's not really any different than going out and getting the shot themselves, except they don't have to freeze in the early morning cold or whatever else might be required.
No more than a paintbrush does, right. Honestly, this is kind of a surprising response from someone who complained about bad-faith arguments. I guess that's what I get for taking you seriously in even small measure 🤡