No, it is a (mis)quote from Terry Pratchett. The wiggly molecules are DNA. (He may have written “twisty”.) More than DNA is what binds to the DNA in various ways regulating them. In the Discworld, Susan Sto Helit had, well, an interesting problem with the capabilities she inherited from her step-grandfather.
There’s a term I ran across years ago: “canalization”. The idea being that the genes metaphorically work like a canal defining the boundaries of possibility, while a given individual with those genes is like a piece of wood tossed into the canal. The exact path the wood will take is a matter of chance and external factors, but it’s always going to stay within the canal short of something drastic happening.