On the evolution of social ties as an instrumental tool for resource competition in resource patch networks

Human is a highly cultural species with diversified skills and knowledge. In this paper, we examine whether the diversification of skills and knowledge can promote the emergence of social ties between individuals as means for acquiring resources. Specifically, we construct a simulation model consisting of two types of actors—one who uses social ties to search for resources and one who does not—and allow them to compete for resources that are distributed in resource patch networks of varying structures. In a densely connected resource patch network, implying a setting with less diversified sets of skills and knowledge, model result demonstrates that social ties can be detrimental to those adopting it. In a sparsely connected network, implying a setting with more diversified sets of skills and knowledge, social-type strategy can outcompete solitary-type strategy. Furthermore, actors with a pure social-type strategy are always inferior to their solitary competitors, regardless the structure of the resource patch network. Our modeling framework is of a very fundamental nature, and its relevance to existing theories and the sociological implication of its results are discussed.

Representation of conscious percept without report in the macaque face patch network

A powerful paradigm to identify the neural correlates of consciousness is binocular rivalry, wherein a constant visual stimulus evokes a varying conscious percept. It has recently been suggested that activity modulations observed during rivalry could represent the act of report rather than the conscious percept itself. Here, we performed single-unit recordings from face patches in macaque inferotemporal (IT) cortex using a no-report paradigm in which the animal’s conscious percept was inferred from eye movements. We found high proportions of IT neurons represented the conscious percept even without active report. Population activity in single trials, measured using a new 128-site Neuropixels-like electrode, was more weakly modulated by rivalry than by physical stimulus transitions, but nevertheless allowed decoding of the changing conscious percept. These findings suggest that macaque face patches encode both the physical stimulus and the animal’s conscious visual percept, and the latter encoding does not require active report.