Originally Posted by
Sageous
^^ Not to beat a dead horse, because I think we're done here, but I can't resist playing with your analogy:
Now, let's reexamine that race.
Let's say that sure, there was a race, and the kid was there, but let's say now that he was much smaller than the other kids, and they really didn't want him in it... but he ran anyway.
The race started, and the rest of the kids were quickly lost in the distance, so the kid was left to race by himself -- which he did, and did quite well; being a kid: In his imagination he had a great surge of energy and accelerated to lightning speed, passing the bigger boys as though they were standing still! His adventure was so vivid that, during the race, he knew he passed all the other kids. It never happened, but the image of doing so was, for him thanks to his his child's imagination, very real -- during his imagined race.
Later, with the images of his fantasy victory already fading but still vaguely present as an apparent moment of reality, the kid catches up with the other kids and tells them how well he did -- because he still sort of remembers doing so, and it still seems real -- and important -- to him. Being bound by reality and their own experience, the bigger kids are confused, and simply laugh at him; which only triggers defense mechanisms in the kid that make him feel even more strongly that he had passed the others.
So he goes home in tears, and his father -- without knowing about the fantasy victory -- only asks him if he remembers knowing that he passed the other kids, which the kid affirms; so he says "If during a race you can pass all of the other racers, then you're certainly winning" And the kid cheers up, happy that someone has confirmed his version of reality.
The boy, in truth, passed no one, but in his need to fit in he afforded himself a fantasy of winning the race and then chose later on to believe that the fantasy had actually happened, because he still possessed a fading memory of doing just that -- and, of course, he really wanted to believe that memory.
It's perhaps not a great analogy, but it makes its point (for me at least): the kid's criterion for winning the race -- passing the other boys -- was certainly met during his fantasy of doing so; even though he wasn't even in the actual race. Later, even though he was shown reality in no uncertain terms (catching up to the boys later, when they should have been catching up to him, and them laughing at him), he chose instead to believe he had won, simply because he had a dim memory of doing so, thanks to the fantasy.
Now let's reverse the story and say that the kid actually did race, and actually did win. But later on, when he comes home and tells his father proudly that he won, his father doesn't believe him, because his son is so small. Though he'll be hurt that his father was unsupportive, the kid won't change is story, because, thanks the the strong, waking-life consciousness memory he has of passing the other boys, he knows he won the race -- and he knows it not because he affirms that "during the the race he passed the other boys," but because he was there.