统一解释复杂性分析,揭示全局解释可高效计算。
Unifying Formal Explanations: A Complexity-Theoretic Perspective
- 提出统一框架,用概率值函数最小化统合充分与对比解释
- 全局设置下多种解释可在多项式时间内计算,有理论保证
- 局部设置即使简化也成NP难,适合关注可解释性理论的研究者
以往研究分别探讨了机器学习模型预测的两类基本解释——充分原因(固定部分特征即可决定预测)和对比原因(修改部分特征会改变预测)的计算复杂性。本文引入统一框架,证明这两类解释均可通过最小化一个统一的概率值函数来刻画。进一步证明,其计算复杂度受该值函数三个组合优化基本性质的影响:单调性、次模性和超模性。令人意外的是,局部值函数不具这些性质,而全局值函数则具备。这一差异使我们能在全局解释设定下,对神经网络、决策树及树集成等多样模型,实现一系列具有理论保障的多项式时间解释计算。相比之下,局部解释即使在简化情况下也变为NP难。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Previous work has explored the computational complexity of deriving two fundamental types of explanations for ML model predictions: (1) *sufficient reasons*, which are subsets of input features that, when fixed, determine a prediction, and (2) *contrastive reasons*, which are subsets of input features that, when modified, alter a prediction. Prior studies have examined these explanations in different contexts, such as non-probabilistic versus probabilistic frameworks and local versus global settings. In this study, we introduce a unified framework for analyzing these explanations, demonstrating that they can all be characterized through the minimization of a unified probabilistic value function. We then prove that the complexity of these computations is influenced by three key properties of the value function: (1) *monotonicity*, (2) *submodularity*, and (3) *supermodularity* - which are three fundamental properties in *combinatorial optimization*. Our findings uncover some counterintuitive results regarding the nature of these properties within the explanation settings examined. For instance, although the *local* value functions do not exhibit monotonicity or submodularity/supermodularity whatsoever, we demonstrate that the *global* value functions do possess these properties. This distinction enables us to prove a series of novel polynomial-time results for computing various explanations with provable guarantees in the global explainability setting, across a range of ML models that span the interpretability spectrum, such as neural networks, decision trees, and tree ensembles. In contrast, we show that even highly simplified versions of these explanations become NP-hard to compute in the corresponding local explainability setting.
Thank you to arXiv for use of its open access interoperability. PaperDance 不是 arXiv 官方产品;中文卡片由大模型生成,请以原文为准。