Yes a big part of it is about messing with the phase to create that binaural effect. The above quote is an oversimplification of just throwing things completely out of phase (or reversing the polarity), but that's not what's happening in real life when a sound is coming behind you. Yes there is a phase difference, but it's more like slipping one of those panned tracks a few milliseconds to replicate the delay time between ears (also called the haas effect). Phase and polarity get so confusing that I made a youtube video to explain and clarify it. Check it out:
Understand Phase in Under 6 Minutes.
But also to make it sound like it's coming from behind you need to replicate the filtering of your outer ears. This is called
Head Related Transfer Function (HRTF) (and that's the wikipedia link). There are some plugins that will do this for you to make things sound like they are coming from behind you while on headphones for example. This is also the concept and technology behind all of those virtual studio mixing on headphones like Slate VSX. This is also how they do 3d audio in games. When you turn your head or move in the game the level difference, phase difference and HRTF of the audio objects all change to change the sonic position of the object.