Hyperspace Hypothesis

Here it is! The topic that has been bugging my mind for months now, and I'm finally putting it in writing! I'll go over the hyperspace theories behind Babylon 5, Star Wars, and Star Trek in that order, and then go over my thoughts on it.

Babylon 5:

In the Babylon 5 TV show, the universe is shown as a large sphere, with the outer edge being real space, or where we live. Hyperspace is the volume of the sphere, and can only be penetrated by using strong energy fields. When the Barrier is penetrated, an effect known as Quantum Tunneling occurs, and it is through this Quantum Tunnel that one would enter hyperspace. See the diagram below. The red line represents the distance one would have to travel in real space to get from the Milky way to Andromeda. The blue line represents hyperspace travel. The straight line into the center of the sphere is traveled instantly, so the only distance traveled is the small blue arc. This is considerably less distance than the red arc in real space, resulting in a dramatic decreases the travel distance between two objects. This idea of hyperspace does not involve going faster then the speed of light, but going a shorter distance.

In some ways, this idea of hyperspace is the most likely of any, because it does not involve the speed of light, which many scientists believe to be impossible to reach. On the other hand, there is no proof that the universe is like a sphere at all, so it may be all wrong in that way.

Star Wars:

In Star Wars, hyperspace is entirely differant. Hyperspace is achieved by going (way) faster then the speed of light. When a ship (say the Millenium Falcon) goes into hyperspace, it experiences a very rapid accelleration to the brink of lightspeed. The problem comes that lightspeed is unachievable by an object with mass. An object with mass may go above or below the speed of light, but may not go exactly the speed of light. Thus the weakest point of this theory. The ship somehow jumps from this subluminal (slower then light) speed to a superluminal (yup, you guessed it) speed, without ever hitting light speed. Obviously, we can't see a way that this would be possible, so it's kinda wierd. Anyway, once an object achieves superluminal speed, it is in hyperspace and is free to accellerate, most ships reaching several thousands of times the speed of light. This, unlike B5, does not involve shortening of any kind, but incredibly high speeds. Aside from the skipping of light speed, this idea would work, and if a way could be found to bypass light speed or go through it, this would be the easiest form of hyperspace travel.

Star Trek:

Star Trek has the simplest and least likely form of hyperspace travel. Actually, they don't use hyperspace all. The ships in Star Trek just accellerate to the speed of light, or a multiple of it, and travel at that speed. While this is simple, it is highly unlikely, as mass cannot travel at the speed of light.

Overall, I think that the B5 version of hyperspace is the most likely, as it follow more physical laws then the other two. I do believe that superluminal speeds are possible, if a device is invented to accellerate through light speed. So far, no man-made thing can accellerate to the speed of light. Scientists have gotten close, though, with particle accellerators. Anyway....I'm tired after all of that and i cant think any more, so if you can make any sense of it all, tell me what you think!