> One hallucinated citation does not in any way imply anyone is being left behind.

The parent said “setting” others behind, which refers to lost time.

Being “left” behind implies a degraded trajectory, which is defined not by time lost, but by the final destination.

Different but related things (e.g. lost time can indeed affect your final destination, for instance, after growing old correcting a scourge of hallucinated citations - which should have been table stakes all along).