> Do you also think it's fine to shit in other people's wells or for companies to dump their toxic waste in the middle of other companies parking lots as long as you/they haven't signed a contract explicitly agreeing not to?

You are using loaded words to 1) imply I would support some questionable actions where you assume intent and 2) refer to negative externalities, but I'll suppose you are not trolling interact in good faith with you.

Both the actions you define are ignoring property rights: your well, your parking lot = I can't do that, unless you allow me (with a contract!)

My well, my parking lot = I can do that, and you don't get to say what I do with my property, unless we have signed a contract which creates liability.

Many people seem to have a strong desire to be able to force ME to update MY browser/operating system/bios/whatever else to be up to THEIR standards, because it has consequences on THEIR liability.

I care a bit about them, but I care way more about MY freedom: I do what I what with MY computers.

Note that intent matters: I have no desire to cause bad things to other people. I'd be very sad if my computer was used as "part of a botnet" like someone else said. I might even try to avoid that - but only as far as it puts my freedom first, and there's not even a requirement that I try (because I might have better things to do lol)

Should bad things like botnets happen, 1) it wasn't my intent, as preserving my freedom was my intent 2) the negative externality is sad, but it's not my liability: you should secure your property, or said differently "your problems aren't my problem"

This whole interaction feels very strange to me. By any chance, are you European? Europeans seem to have very different concepts of freedom and liability than we do.