I don't know that that's true of the Easter Bunny, but I don't think that changes the comparison. Do you really want to say that you don't know that there's not a teapot in orbit around Mars without getting into a little rocket ship and going to see?
The Easter Bunny must have an immanent existence - if not, how am I getting all those chocolate eggs? I can't eat transcendent chocolate
I have no reason to beleive that there is a teapot orbiting around Mars. That doesn't mean that there isn't one. As it has no practical impact on my life, though, I see no reason to jump to any hasty conclusions in the matter
I fear for the masturbating bears, though. I don't know how long they could possibly hold their breath for.
The comparison
is changed when you consider the type of existence (ie. immanent or transcendent) that the object we are considering is posited to have. When we make a judgment about the existence of an immanent object we have certain bases for those judgments - the laws of physics, say, or simply our experience of the world. Occaisonly we will come up with a black swan and have to recalibrate our ideas a little, but I think in the case of undersea masturbating bears we know enough about the nature of bears and the ocean to know that such an idea is fanciful. Could a teapot actually orbit Mars? I suppose it probably could for a time. There is a certain amount of plausability there, but that is undermined by the fact that a teapot would have to be transported to that point in space in order for it to take on that orbital path. Again, there is good reason to believe that this has not occured.
The idea of an existence that transcends the immanent universe is different. Our laws of physics, for instance, are only laws within this universe. There is no reason to believe that outside of this universe those laws continue to function in the same way. All our experience pertains to this universe, so we can not really use any of this experience to make judgments about potential existence outside of it.
We have a lot of unanswered questions about our universe, how it is that there is something rather than nothing for starters. We humans create things ourselves - we create virtual worlds, for instance, with computers. It is understandable, I think, that some would suggest that our own world is a creation in much the same way as a possible solution to this question. That requires a creator which transcends the immanent universe, however, so we do not have the capacity to use the knowledge forms we have available to interogate this suggestion in any meaningful way.
I would suggest that the specific claims of specific religions, about virgin births, resurections, turning water into wine, meditating to enlightenment, talking to the spirits of the earth, etc. etc. could be compared to the bears and the teapot - these are stories which refer to immanent actions. There is indeed little reason to believe the tales of the organised religions of the world (or the unorgainsed ones too for that matter). The stories of the Bible are much easier to dismiss than the idea that there is existence which transcends the universe.
