OK, but it explains the FE too, & that's just as important or more than the Lag portion.
Your P/C decides if you collide.
Your opponents P/C decides if he collides.
If you see the white message saying "XXXX has collided with you" but you died, then...he shot you. The positional info just generated the message because you were both in the same spot at the same time on ONE of the FE's (your opponents).
If you see "you have collided" your FE has determined you were in the same spot at the same time & hit the other guy, you are assigned damage according to what your FE saw (it could be minor), if you were pulling the trigger at the same time...then your opponent might see "XXXX has collided with you" while he is going down scratching his head.
If you read the net lag article where it explains the FE & lag then this should make perfect sense, the only thing the net lag article didn't explain was the color coded text buffer messages, white like the P.M. is one FE to another or one P/C to another if that makes more sense, so the white message is his FE or yours sending the message.
So..to recap, if you got the white message "XXXX has collided with you" but it was YOU who died, he was firing his weapons & that is what killed you. He may not have seemed damaged from that collision, but he probably was, even if it was minor. His FE decided what he hit & how much damage to assign to his plane.
Heck, factor in lag & it gets really complicated with smooting codes & what not.
