Good points.
I feel like its similar to the Dark Arts arguments that we've had before, where there's an accurate idea that doesn't sound so cool to say and making it cooler to say might make it less accurate.
A shorter sentence can play with language tricks, whereby something sounds profound without being so. A longer explanation by virtue of its length cannot sustain itself on mere language trickery.
Agreed. But there's nothing wrong with a short sentence where something is profound, and sounds so. Making those are tricky
A more detailed explanation has time and space to fully, or at least partially, reveal and explore the implications of the idea, where a shorter sentence can sound wise but have no real implications.
The more startling and potentially groundbreaking an idea is, the more actual work needs to be done to set it up properly. For instance, by itself saying "Thou art physics." while it might sound wise, wouldn't lead to a proper understanding of how that dissolves the question of free will. That requires a rather extensive explanation.
I think the tweets should just have links in them. That way people get a fun aphorism to read and remember, and if they're interested they can follow through, read the link, and get the fuller picture.
During the latest London Meetup, I asked: "If you could spread one meme about rationality to the mainstream, what would that be?"
I realize that certain parts of rationality, like cognitive biases, should be taught as a unit, but I hypothesize that there exist rationality-enhancing lessons that can fit in 140 characters and stand on their own. Given that we want to spread rationality to those close to us and everyone else as well, it may be useful to work on developing compact versions of our most potent insights, and work on phrasing them in a way that is accessible to the mainstream.
So this thread is a challenge to do just that: pick a rationality-related insight, and try to find 140 characters (or less) that express it well for the purpose of spreading it further. It may be a quote that has appeared in our quotes thread, it may be in the form of a joke, or maybe just a compact insight that can resonate. A non-obvious challenge is to avoid getting evaluated as 'obviously true' and discarded. I guess a better target reaction is ("this sounds intriguing"->"huh, I hadn't thought about this that way!")
Don't worry too much about getting it perfect the first time; we can use the threaded comments system to collaborate. If you see a way to improve a sentence, propose the improvement as a response to it. forming a tree of alternative versions, with votes to sort them.
If you see a version of a meme developed somewhere in the thread that reaches your required awesomeness threshold, you can also post it to your (facebook/twitter/whatever else) followers. I certainly will.
Edit: As per Luke's suggestion, I went and made a twitter account that we can use to tweet good sentences that come out of this thread. Feel free to follow.