Can I disable the animation that occurs when switching between Spaces?

Yes, you can! You'll need to be running Mac OS X 10.6.4 or higher, then just follow these steps:

1. Open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
   
2. Copy and paste the following into the terminal window and then press enter:
   defaults write com.apple.dock workspaces-swoosh-animation-off -bool YES && killall Dock

If you'd like to re-enable the animation, just do the following:

1. Open
   
2. Copy and paste the following into the terminal window and then press enter:
   defaults delete com.apple.dock workspaces-swoosh-animation-off && killall Dock