Epigenetics and the Biocentric Paradigm: Biological Foundations for an Educational Transition in the Age of Environmental Crisis

Abstract

In recent decades, epigenetics has consolidated evidence that gene expression is modulated by environmental, social, and behavioral factors, overcoming the classic paradigm of genetic determinism. This article presents an interdisciplinary theoretical-conceptual analysis that investigates how the foundations of epigenetic regulation offer a scientific basis for rethinking contemporary educational models in the context of the global environmental crisis. It is argued that the functional interdependence between organism and environment, demonstrated in studies on stress, phenotypic plasticity, and epigenetic inheritance, supports the need for an educational paradigm aligned with ecological integrity. Education is interpreted as a modulating symbolic-social environment, capable of indirectly influencing epigenetic determinants associated with population health. It concludes that the biocentric paradigm emerges as an ethical hypothesis coherent with contemporary biological reality, not as a deterministic derivation, but as an inference based on the systemic interdependence of life.