Before revision:  We demonstrate that the inferred couplings are independent of the stimulus used for learning, and can be used to predict the correlated activity in response to more complex stimuli.
After revision:  We demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach on retinal recordings. The same coupling network is inferred from responses to radically different stimulus ensembles, showing that these couplings indeed reflect stimulus-independent interactions between neurons. The inferred model predicts accurately the collective response of retinal ganglion cell populations as a function of the stimulus used for learning, and can be used to predict the correlated activity in response to more complex stimuli.