They contain humans. However, while corporations themselves are psychopathic, most are not controlled and staffed by psychopaths. This gives corporations (thank Darwin) cognitive biases which systematically reduce their intelligence when pursuing obviously unFriendly goals.
In the end, it depends on your definition of intelligence. The intelligence of a corporation in choosing strategies to fit its goals is sometimes of the level of natural selection (weak), sometimes human intelligence (true), and sometimes effective crowd intelligence (mildly superhuman). I’d guess that on the whole, they average somewhat below human intelligence (but much higher power) when pursuing explicitly unFriendly subgoals; and somewhat above human intelligence when pursuing subgoals that happen to be neutral or Friendly. But that does not necessarily mean they are on balance Friendly, because their root goals are not.
The basic idea with corporations is that they are kept in check by an even more powerful organisation: the government. If any corporation gets too big, the Monopolies and Mergers commission intervenes and splits it up. As far as I know, no corporation has ever overthrown their “parent” government.
Why are corporations “not truly intelligent”? They contain humans, surely. Would you say that humans are “not truly intelligent” either?
They contain humans. However, while corporations themselves are psychopathic, most are not controlled and staffed by psychopaths. This gives corporations (thank Darwin) cognitive biases which systematically reduce their intelligence when pursuing obviously unFriendly goals.
In the end, it depends on your definition of intelligence. The intelligence of a corporation in choosing strategies to fit its goals is sometimes of the level of natural selection (weak), sometimes human intelligence (true), and sometimes effective crowd intelligence (mildly superhuman). I’d guess that on the whole, they average somewhat below human intelligence (but much higher power) when pursuing explicitly unFriendly subgoals; and somewhat above human intelligence when pursuing subgoals that happen to be neutral or Friendly. But that does not necessarily mean they are on balance Friendly, because their root goals are not.
The basic idea with corporations is that they are kept in check by an even more powerful organisation: the government. If any corporation gets too big, the Monopolies and Mergers commission intervenes and splits it up. As far as I know, no corporation has ever overthrown their “parent” government.
Other governments however...