In the picture of eternal inflation as driven by a scalar potential with
multiple minima, our observable universe resides inside one of many bubbles
formed from transitions out of a false vacuum. These bubbles necessarily
collide, upsetting the homogeneity and isotropy of our bubble interior, and
possibly leading to detectable signatures in the observable portion of our
bubble, potentially in the Cosmic Microwave Background or other precision
cosmological probes. This constitutes a direct experimental test of eternal
inflation and the landscape of string theory vacua. Assessing this possibility
roughly splits into answering three questions: What happens in a generic bubble
collision? What observational effects might be expected? How likely are we to
observe a collision? In this review we report the current progress on each of
these questions, improve upon a few of the existing results, and attempt to lay
out directions for future work.Comment: Review article; comments very welcome. 24 pages + 4 appendices; 19
color figures. (Revised version adds two figures, minor edits.
