After forty years I've gone back to working with planes for thicknessing tops. Two reasons really, one, having to do it at the Romanillos course made me realize how effective it is, and two, having recently acquired a stock of aged European spruce which requires lots of special handling. Also a plane cut gives me a far better sense of the wood than a sanded finish.
I will probably drift back into more and more use of the sander eventually, but the planes have given me just one more weapon in the arsenal.
As for Global warming........here is all I have to say on that subject...
http://www.all-she-wrote.com/Once%20the ... 20Melt.htm