Theory:Doctor Who television discontinuity and plot holes/Enlightenment


 * There are still a few fragments of the red jewel left after the Doctor picks them up. Why not pick-up the rug the jewel fragments are on rather than try to transfer them into the handkerchief anyway?
 * He was pushed for time, and picking up an entire rug isn't the quickest way to do anything.


 * Why don't Wrack and her first mate vanish the instant they are pushed overboard the Buccaneer, towards the end of episode four, like the Eternals who are forced to walk the plank earlier in the story do?
 * Black Guardian protection?


 * Solar winds do not travel fast enough to propel the ships at the speeds they are obviously capable of, given the relatively short amount of time it takes them to travel between the planets of the solar system.
 * The solar winds do not actually propel the ship. They are merely the source of energy which is converted within the drive sections of each ship, into another form of faster motive power.


 * Why would the Black &amp; White Guardians be holding a race for the Eternals in the first place? They are the Guardians of universal order and chaos, not cosmic entertainment providers.
 * The Eternals potential for creating problems for both of them, in their quest for entertaining distractions is formidable. Organizing the occasional mass event like this just makes the Guardians existences easier in the long-run.
 * To judge from the whimsical nature of their manifestations (such as the southern gent in "The Ribos Operation", to say nothing of bird-themed headgear ...) even the Guardians occasionally feel the need to inject some amusement into their appointed roles.


 * Tegan spots a rack of anachronistic scuba divers' wet-suits aboard the Shadow, but their presence is never explained and they are never seen nor referred to again.
 * They aren't actually scuba diver's wet-suits, they're futuristic space-suits that just happen to look like wet-suits. While it is likely a writing oversight that they have these when it's clear the ship's on-deck atmosphere is Earth-like, and no other ship uses them, we can assume that they're a redundancy in case the deck's life-support fails (the other Eternals likely not caring enough for such a precaution).
 * The ondeck atmosphere is breathable. The atmospheric bubble may not extend up into the rigging, where the crew would need to climb.