Great Question! Finally someone asks the simplest questions, which almost invariably are the real critical ones (if I cannot explain a great idea to an intelligent man in minutes, it simply means I do not understand it). 

In this case, the idea is one of the greatest in modern history. 

Let me start with a historical background: in the  90s I talked with Stan Tennenbaum about Forcing, hoping to (finally!)  understand it (did not go too far) . Here is what he told me (not verbatim): during those times,late 50s and very early 60s,  several folks were trying their hand to prove independence. 

What did they know? They certainly knew that they had to add a set G to the minimal model, and then close up with respect to  Godel constructibility operations. So far nothing mysterious: it is a bit like adding a complex number to Q and form an algebraic field. 

**First blocker**: if I add a set G which certainly exists to construct the function you described above, *how do I know that M[G] is still a model of ZF*?

 In algebraic number theory I do not have this issue, I simply take the new number , and throw it into the pot, but here I do. *Sets carry along information*, and some of this information can be devastating (simple example: suppose that G is gonna tell that the first ordinal outside of  M is in fact reachable, that would be very bad news. 


All this was known to the smart folks at the time. What they did not know is: very well, I am in a mine field, how then **I select** my G so it does not create trouble and do what is supposed to do? That is the fundamental question. 

**They wanted to find G,  describe it, and then add it.** 

Enter Cohen. In a majestic feat of mathematical innovation, *Cohen, rather than going into the mine field outside of M searching for the ideal G, enters M*. He looks at the world outside, so to speak, from inside (I like to think of him looking at the starry sky, call it  V, from his little M). 

Rather than finding the mysterious G which floats freely  in the hyperspace outside M, he says: ok, suppose I wanted to build G, brick by brick, inside M. After all, I know what is supposed to do for me, right? Problem is,  I cannot, because if I could it would be constructible in M, and therefore part of M. Back to square one. 

BUT: *although G is not constructible in M, all its finite portions are, assuming such a G is available in the outer world*. It does not exist in M, but the bricks which make it (in your example all the finite approximation of the function), *all of them*,  are there. Moreover, these finite fragments can be partially ordered, just like little pieces of information: one is sometimes bigger than the other, etc

Of course this order is not total. So, he says, let us describe that partial order, call it P. **P is INSIDE M**, all of it. Cohen has the bricks, and he knows which brick fit others, to form some pieces of walls here and there, but not the full house, not  G. Why? because the glue which attach these pieces all together in a coherent way is not there. M does not know about the glue. Cohen is almost done: he steps out of the model, and bingo! there is plenty of glue. 

If I add an ultrafilter, it will assemble consistently all the pieces of information, and I have my model. I do not need to explicitly describe it, it is enough to know that the glue is real (outside). Now we go back to the last insight of Cohen. How does he know that glueing all pieces along the ultrafilter  will not "mess things up"? Because, and the funny thing is M knows it, all information coming with G is already reached at some point of the glueing process, so it is available in  M. 

Finale

What I just said about the set of fragments of information, is entirely codable in M. M knows everything, except the glue. It even knows the "forcing relation", in other words it knows that IF M[G]  exists, then truth in M[G] corresponds to some piece of information from within forcing it.  

**LAST NOTE** One of my favorite books in Science Fiction was written by the set theorist converted to writer, Dr. Rudy Rucker. The book is called White Light, and is a big celebration of Cantorian Set Theory written by an insider. It just misses one pearl, the most glorious one: Forcing. Who knows, someone here, perhaps you, will write the sequel to White Light and show the splendor of Cohen's idea not only to "ordinary mathematicians" but to everybody...

**ADDENDUM: SHELAH's LOGICAL DREAM** (see commentary of Tim Chow)


Tim, you have no idea how many thoughts your  fantastic post has generated in my mind in the last 20 hours.  Shelah 's dream can be made reality, but it ain't easy, though now at least I have some clue as to how to begin. 


It is the "virus control method": suppose you take M and throw in some G 
which is living in the truncated V cone where M lives. Add G. The very moment you add it, you are forced to  add all sets which are G-constructibles in  alpha steps, where alpha is any  ordinal in M. Now, let us say that the most lethal viral attack perpetrated by G is that one of these new sets is exactly alpha_0, 
the first ordinal not in M, in other words G or its definable sets code a 
well order of type alpha_0. 

If one carries out the analysis I have just sketched, the conjecture would be that a G which does not cause any damage is a set which is as close as possible to be definable in M already,  in some sense to be made precise,but that goes along Cohen's intuition, namely that although G is not M-constructible, all its fragments  are. 

If this plan can be implemented, it would show that forcing is indeed unique, unless.... unless some other crazy idea come into play