The Enlightenment only appears once, in the episode "Holoship" (Series V, Episode 1). In the commentary for this episode Danny John-Jules amusingly gasps when the characters refer to the Enlightenment as "a computer generated ship". It was in fact a model made of transparent perspex. In the Series V extras DVD, there are unused clips of the Enlightenment bending its main structure about its articulation points; no other ship in the Red Dwarf series is known to do this.The Enlightenment is a hologramatic ship with no mass or volume and composed entirely of tachyons, or super-light particles, and which has the ability to travel many multiples the speed of light and even create wormholes to travel instantaneously from one point in space to the other. Kryten knew about the "holoship" as the project was in its initial phase when he left the Solar System.
The Enlightenment carries the "hologrammatical cream of the space corps" and the hologram crew are all top in his or her field; some are geniuses and most of them have an IQ over 200. Because of their intellectual superiority, they are notoriously arrogant towards other the crews of other "lesser" vessels. They see stupidity everywhere. They are described by Dave Lister as being "emotionally weird" as they have abandoned all concept of relationships and family, which they view as the results of "short term hormonal imbalances". However, ship regulations say that each crew member must participate in sexual congress at least twice daily, for exercise and to relieve frustration. As they are holograms and the ship is also a hologram, and a very sophisticated one, holograms can have an effective physical presence onboard, being able to eat, drink, touch, feel and taste anything on the ship
With a full crew complement of 2000 (no more holograms can be projected or it would be too much of a drain of the system, so it would seem), the only way for another hologram to join the crew is "dead man's boots", or to challenge an existing crew member and prove intellectually superior. For any new crew members, another crew member must go through a series of two ridiculously difficult tests. If the original crew member fails the test or withdraws, the new crew member takes the place of the original crew member along with their run-time, effectively killing the loser.
Arnold Rimmer temporarily joined this crew when he challenged flight officer Nirvanah Crane and she withdrew from their challenge (to give him a chance), and Crane was deactivated so Rimmer could take her place. However, Rimmer had developed feelings for Crane (the first time in his life he had ever felt feelings for anybody) and resigned back to Red Dwarf so that Nirvanah could be reinstated and live again. For her he gave up a position of command, something he had always wanted, he also gave up an effective physical presence and a life of constant sex with beautiful women.
