Talk:Akatsuki-class destroyer (1931)

Turrets

The article describes the enclosed twin five-inch gun mountings as 'gun turrets', but then back-pedals on this, calling them next 'gunhouses' and then technically 'gun mountings' rather than 'true turrets'. This is, of course, problematic. Not least for the lay reader, who is left their own devices in how to understand what these large, fully-enclosed rotating gun positions were.

To clarify; they were turrets. They were fully enclosed, they provided protection and they facilitated the directing, elevation and thus aiming of the guns contained within. This meets the criteria for a gun turret. That they were unarmoured is not relevant to this definition. An armoured turret which has its armour plating removed and is left with just metal skin plating in place of the armour is still a turret as long as it functions mechanically and environmentally in the same manner that it did when equipped with armour.

Different points of view appearing in the main article in this manner serve not to enlighten, or to reinforce fact, but to confuse. Sadly, it is just a reflection of a completely benign and thoroughly natural human tendency; the tendency toward different perspectives between individuals. But we should strive for two key essentials within Wikipedia articles:

1) Consistency of language (even when it seems that the lexicon is being repeated frequently; science does just this, by the way, in the quest for accuracy).

2) Accuracy of ideas being communicated.

In this case, even if it means using the word 'turret' more times than some might feel comfortable with, we must remember that a good article can still be good whilst communicating to the reader as though they were a five-year-old. Let them leave with the idea firmly established and then reinforced that a turret is a turret, even if there was some technical discussion along the way. 2A00:23C7:3119:AD01:8191:C1B:C557:2866 (talk) 00:17, 4 October 2022 (UTC)