Well no. I can imagine lots of things in my head that are impossible but would be correctly lit, and I could do the same in Blender.

Not really, you could imagine another technique that 3D models it without force but with raytracing, puts it in that scene and takes a picture, the result would look better. That could then be a starting point for trying to get the lighting an panels just right to make the best reflections.

When you forgo process the odds that you'll make good art drop to 0. Tool use is a much better path forward for self driving, artistic computer than big data. Images 2.6 only has use as a tool.

I've never understood why people have this viewpoint. If there is no preference for one property of a work (ie. lighting) to match reality just because another unrelated property (biology) doesn't, then surely the only possible scenarios remaining are an exact replica of the real world (where all properties match the real world) or an entirely arbitrary construction (where no properties should match reality). Fiction is predicated on the idea of "reality, but...". Saying that any single difference from reality should lead you to expect no similarities to reality at all, if followed, would collapse all fictions into pure arbitrary soup.

nah, the physical light is still a real concept, and it looks really shitty here.

The point of fantasy or even surrealism is to contrast with the parts of the work that are chosen to be realistic. When random parts of the work are broken in meaningless ways it becomes slop