Exactly the same experience here. I had a friend of a friend who was into FE years ago and I always dismissed it, I just never cared enough to consider anything. Then when you see someone who doesn’t use insane arguments to support the idea, it begins to have credibility, and covid lead me down the path.

I grew up catholic, became atheist and now I’ve trended back towards believing that something created us, it’s far more plausible than the other explanations to me. Then you look into origin of life research, learn that is all fallacious and the rabbit hole just gets deeper and deeper.

Modern science has totally turned into a religion; you have to believe everything without question or else you’re a “denier”.