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Good question.
It was decided toward the beginning of the project that this would be a flat earth cosmology Silmarillion. The notes in MT outlining the change to a round earth cosmology were deemed unworkable (that is, implementing them would require a great deal of creative re-writing of the ealier material.
Various proposals for a round earth version have been made, though. And I don't think it was ever made entirely clear whether we are saying that Arda is truly flat or merely that in the Numenorean "Silmarillion" tradition it is said to be flat.
In any case, though, this does mean that we don't have to worry about the Earendil as Venus problem - which is in my mind the biggest flaw in the MT round earth cosmology.
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