We don't have enough words for photography. Can you imagine writers having only one word for writing?
Photography extends our perception allowing us to see and experience more - second hand.
Photography is much more about elimination than inclusion. The images we make with a lens typically eliminate ninety percent of our field of view and everything that is out of our field of view. The shutter slices time, eliminating all moments before and after it opens and closes. Three dimensions are reduced to two. And in some cases color is removed. How can we call these kinds of artifacts unaltered?