The author is also suggesting that a data structure consisting of a sea of objects referencing each other works perfectly in Python. It doesn’t — Python’s GC ca

The author is also suggesting that a data structure consisting of a sea of objects referencing each other works perfectly in Python. It doesn’t — Python’s GC can only collect it as a cycle, and this path is not immediate the way the refcount is. And you’re paying for refcounts. Even in a language with full tracing GC (Java, etc), you’re not winning any performance points by making a ton of objects all referencing each other. Indices or arenas or such will result in better code in all these languages.