A question regarding modifications and inventory placement

There was a link posted earlier today to a site proporting to have the optimal way to organize your inventory. Other than some issues people had with the content, there was a thread in the comments discussing modifications, and requirements for how they're placed in your inventory, be it for your Exosuit, Starship, or Multi-tool. The comments were suggesting that, in order for a modification to be in use it must touch, directly or indirectly through related modifications, the feature that it's modifying. So for example, Life Support modules must be in a slot next to the Life Support in your Exosuit, or another module designed to modify Life Support that is touching it.

When I read this I was immediately confused. This is a screenshot of my Exosuit inventory, and this is my Multi-Tool. Prior to reading this thread my Life Support modification was on the right side of my inventory, and it sure seemed like it was working as intended. But to be certain I dismantled it and ran around without it for a while, and found that my Life Support system was indeed draining much faster.

As you can see with my Multi-Tool, the beam modifications aren't directly connected to the Beam too, and yet I'm almost certain that they're having a substantial impact on the rate at which I can harvest materials.

tl;dr: Do mods really need to be touching the tool they're enhancing, or was that just rubbish?