How Much X is in XAI: Responsible Use of “explainable” Artificial Intelligence in Hydrology and Water Resources

Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) offers the promise of being able to provide additional insight into complex hydrological problems. As the “new kid on the block”, these methods are embraced enthusiastically and often viewed as offering something radically new and different. However, upon closer inspection, many XAI approaches are very similar to more “traditional” methods of “interrogating” existing models, such as sensitivity or break-even analysis. In fact, the approach of developing data-driven models to obtain a better understanding of hydrological processes to inform the development of more physics-based models is as old as hydrology itself. Consequently, rather than being considered a new approach, XAI should be viewed as part of a long-standing tradition, and XAI methods part of an ever-expanding hydrological modelling toolkit, rather than a silver bullet. Critically, there needs to be shift from focusing on how to best eXplain what AI models have learnt (i.e., the X component of XAI) to developing models that are able to capture relationships that are contained within the data in a robust and reliable fashion (i.e., the AI component of XAI), as there is little value in explaining AI-derived relationships if these do not reflect underlying hydrological processes. However, this is often not the case due to a focus on maximising the predictive ability of AI models “at all costs”, not uncommonly resulting in large models that often have thousands or even millions of parameters that are not well defined. Consequently, these models generally do not capture underlying hydrological processes in a robust and reliable fashion. Finally, there is also a need to stop thinking about XAI as a purely technical approach, but a socio-technical approach that views XAI as a process that can assist with solving problems that are situated within broader social and political contexts.