You see this principle in privacy laws too.

I can be in a room looking at something with my eyeballs and listening with my ears perfectly legally... But it would not be legal if I replaced myself with a humanoid mannequin with a video camera for a head.

You can even write down what you are looking at and listening to, although in some cases, dissemination of, e.g. verbatim copies in your writing could be considered copying.

But it is automatically copying if you use a copier.