What actually happens is that the climate undergoes a relatively rapid change, then stabilizes at some new equilibrium. The climate will change by a few degrees, and then settle down at that level. **On the other hand, a change of a few degrees in a short time, even if it does not alter life, or even humanity, will still affect current patterns of weather quite dramatically. **

Every year one has a large change in the temperatures in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres on Earth.
Now you could call changing of seasons of winter and summer "affecting current patterns of weather quite dramatically". But they are *far more* than changes in temperatures by a "few of degrees".

"Civilization will probably not survive the economic dislocations brought about by massive changes in rainfall patterns and their effect on agriculture. Man may survive, in a more primitive state, and life on earth
will continue as if nothing happened. But your greenhouse effect is a straw man argument you are invoking because it can be easily disproved. It's a cheap rhetorical trick that has already been tried here by other ideological hacks and it won't wash. "

Civilization has already survive "massive changes in rainfall pattern".
Civilization has also already survived changes on global temperatures by 2 or 3 degrees over short periods- which occur within a few years- and has also survived such changes occurring in less than a few decades and lasting for centuries.

Large changes in global temperature when it become warmer, lead to periods known as "better times", large changes in global temperatures in which it gets cooler by 2 to 3 degrees [such as during the Little Ice age, are known as "not so good times". And what's commonly called the Dark Ages in Europe occurred during another of these cooler periods [which btw was also recorded to be colder in Asia during this same time].

"And by the way, water vapor is not a greenhouse gas, because at the high altitudes at which the terrestrial greenhouse effect dominates, water freezes out and the CO2 molecule is just the right size to increase the atmospheric opacity to infrared radiation. That's why carbon dioxide is the dominant greenhouse gas. Not even responsible critics of AGW bring up that ridiculous water objection any more. As Mr P. suggests, go to realclimate.org and educate yourself."

Water vapor is a greenhouse gas. Water vapor is thought to be the largest component in Earth's Greenhouse affect.
You can look this up anywhere, just search "Greenhouse affect".
Now, water vapor is not mention as a greenhouse gas by some because it doesn't fit in their classification of a "forcing agent". Basically one way to say this is that water vapor is seen as "the thing which is being forced". Or that water vapor is described as passive or in response to other gases "which are man caused".
Now, it should obvious to any fool, that they are employing terminology which has a definite bias. One "result" of this terminology is that Dr Clayton Forrester is
fooled into ignoring the most significant greenhouse gas.
It is also a situation where the fish doesn't know it's in water.

As for high altitudes. First, one should look at temperature at these high altitudes.
If you want to focus on the greenhouse affect starting at say 10 km in elevation. I suggest you re-visit the whole idea of the greenhouse affect. Which is explanation for warmer average temperature than compare to what Earth "should be" compared to it's Black body temperature.
There isn't much of difference between black body temperature and the temperatures at above 10 km- in other words there no need for a greenhouse affect to "explain" the "difference". Which is also way of saying there isn't much of a greenhouse affect above 10 km.

Now, you can "prove" this in another way. There isn't much of any atmosphere above 10 km. And CO2 is about the same percentage above 10 km than compared to below 10 km.
So there is a small percentage of the atmosphere which is below 10 km which is CO2 and there is a small percentage of very thin atmosphere which is CO2.

"1/2 of atmosphere at 5,486 meter or 18,000'
1/3 of atmosphere above 8,376 meters or 27,480'
1/10 of atmosphere above 16,132 meters or 52,926' "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_pressure

Btw, one way to "take out the water vapor" and measure
the greenhouse affect from such gases as CO2, is measure the temperature above where there is no or very little water vapor [and clouds and other factors]. Compare this average temperature to Earth's black body temperature.

So say you measure temperature at 16,132 meters elevation. So, you times this difference between black body and average temperature by 10 [because a 1/10th of the atmosphere is above it] and that is about the greenhouse affect from all other gases other than water vapor. Though one could need to somehow remove from this any greenhouse affect due to O3 [ozone]- you can't times the greenhouse affect of the ozone by 10.