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If you would like to echo (i.e. see the data in the terminal), you want to use:

$rostopic echo laser_scan_topic

Where you replace laser_scan_topic with the name of the topic that your laser is publishing to. To record, you want to use the rosbag tool, as described in this tutorial: http://wiki.ros.org/rosbag/Tutorials/Recording%20and%20playing%20back%20data

 $rosbag record laser_scan_topic
 $rosbag play <bagfile-name>

The tutorials also have alot of other, helpful tools to understanding topics, nodes, etc.

Most lasers publish in polar coordinates, but if you want to sense objects you will need to install and run another package that uses the laser scan info (or write your own :)).