"But something remains unexplained by this B-theory explanation of my emotional attitude to past and future pain. Why is dread only appropriate before the pain, and relief only appropriate after it? This aspect of Prior’s challenge has recently been articulated and reissued against the new B-theory of time by David Cockburn (1997, see also his 1998).

Cockburn argues that the new B-theory must ultimately be committed to a radical revision of our emotional lives, since it cannot square our different emotional responses to past, present and future events with the claim that they are all equally real. The B-theory, according to Cockburn, faces an unhappy dilemma. It must provide an explanation for the different kinds of significance that we attach to past, present and future events (something he believes it is unable to do). Alternatively, it must urge that we abandon our usual emotional responses to past, present and future events in favour of a pattern of responses whereby all events are equally significant. According to Cockburn, unless the B-theory can provide a rational justification for our asymmetric emotional attitudes, it is forced to take the revisionary alternative."