I think you’re conflating legal contracts and smart contracts. Legal contracts are instruments used by two or more parties that outlines their responsibilities to one another in a way that is protected by civil law. A smart contract is just a program that runs on the blockchain.
Do you see how the name "smart contract" makes no sense? They aren't smart. In fact, they are obviously dumb. They do what the code says. They aren't a contract in the legal sense. Smart contracts are neither smart, nor contracts.
So we’ve gone from debating the technical merits to debating the name?
The name likely comes from options contracts, which are technically contracts but traded like equities. Most options are very simple tuple: (equity, strike price, call / put). The smart in smart contract can mean writing a smarter option contract.
