Things which don't exist don't add up.

In Nothing is Greater than the Sum of it's parts, I argue that emergent systems do not exist. That every system is nothing more than a collection of it's individual parts and that with full knowledge of those parts, the behavior of the system should be fully predictable.

This is true, but there is a collar to this: Only things which exist add up. Physical phenomenon and empirical effects add up to create a system. Thoughts, feelings and emotions do not. This is because the latter category are things which do not exist in reality but in our minds. 

Because of this, the intentions or interests of people who make up a system do not necessarily match those of the system itself. Is pretending that systems can have intentions false? Yes, only people can have intent. Is it bad? No. Not all lies are evil and anthropomorphizing systems can be a useful lie.