Imagine having Flavio Manzoni as Chief Design Officer but deciding that for the most revolutionary car you'll ever need to make you want someone that never designed a car
It's missing the easiest of the choices: core performance-sensitive code in C, interface it to python with pybind11, build app in python. Small stack, huge gains, best of both worlds.
One thing that's not mentioned here: if you don't come from a top university, you have close-to-zero chances to have that kind of experience in your phd. If you're not incredibly picking some exceptionally relevant project soon enough, your career path after the phd will not be exactly the smooth sailing the author describes.
The final transition happened with the death of online forums. I still miss those dearly. I've met extremely interesting and competent people with a true desire to interact with passionate peers. They thought me how to ask for and give advice, how to express opinions in public, the value of growing a community around common interest, and the joy of laughing and getting angry on the OT section.