Delete features without creating new output with ArcPy

Question

Is it possible to delete features from an existing dataset without creating a new output feature class with ArcPY?

I have a dataset I'm working with and it gets altered over and over again throughout the whole script. Creating a new output feature class every time is going to get very very confusing. Is there no way to delete features without creating a new output file? It's not like you can select records and delete them from the main dataset since Select creates a new output file as well. Anything you delete from a selected set won't be reflected in the "real" dataset since selections are separate files. Am I wrong in this logic?

MKF62 · Accepted Answer

I figured out how to do it, I think. I was using Select but you could use MakeFeatureLayer and then use SelectLayerByAttribute on that. Then you can delete the selected set using DeleteFeatures without creating a new output shapefile/feature class. It does appear to do what I need it to do, whether it's truly the "right" way to do it or not.