"You can't copyright a fact (like a number), but you can copyright a creative work, like a song or a piece of software. But since one can be transformed into another, copyright law is logically INCOHERENT."
Does a number that represents a range within Pi, get also coloured as copyrighted if your intent while computing it was the search for a copyright coloured sequence of bits within Pi ?
I think that for a lawyer it doesn't really matter; it doesn't matter which technique you're using to encode your data, as long as somebody can access that content and you did that on purpose. They're good at dealing with loosely defined things like intent, better than with formally defined things.
I wonder what amount (and progress) of AI research has been done in this area; not all illogical things are bullshit, however you might want to feel about them. Anti-digital-rights sentiment (disclaimer: I personally deplore much of the consequences about enforcement of digital rights, so I share that sentiment at many levels) sometimes can cloud judgement, and I've seen many people invoke rational thinking so well they successfully miss the point.
"You can't copyright a fact (like a number), but you can copyright a creative work, like a song or a piece of software. But since one can be transformed into another, copyright law is logically INCOHERENT."