"/a" is not "/a" ?

[Albert Hopkins]

On Fri, 2009-03-06 at 23:57 -0800, Paul Rubin wrote:
> alex23 <wuwei23 at gmail.com> writes:
> > But _you_ only _just_ stated "It does have some (generally small)
> > performance ramifications as
> > well" and provided timing examples to show it. Without qualification.
> 
> The performance difference can be large if the objects are (for
> example) long lists.

I would think (not having looked) that the implementation of == would
first check for identity (for performance reasons)... but then that lead
me to ask: can an object be identical but not equal to itself?