Fig. 1

A: Sensory-evoked responses are variable. Here we predict whether responses are large (orange) or small (blue), using (B) features of the pre-stimulus activity. C: Ideal observer analysis of spontaneous and sensory-evoked activity, based on matched filter detection alone (single eye) or pre-stimulus state-dependent matched-filter detection (pair of eyes). LFP trace shown is a period of spontaneous (no sensory inputs) activity in which accounting for pre-stimulus state (during orange bar) would prevent a false alarm (gray box)