Question about Java polymorphism and casting

Question

I have a class C. Class E extends it.

E e = new E();
C c = new C();

Why is

e = (E) c;

Upon further review

Answer 1

You can't cast objects in Java.

You can cast references in Java.

Casting a reference doesn't change anything about the object it refers to. It only produces a reference of a different type pointing to the same object as the initial reference.

Casting primitive values is different from casting references. In this case the values do change.