Explainable artificial intelligence (XAI) has gained significant traction in the machine learning community in recent years because of the need to generate “explanations” of how these typically black-box tools operate that are accessible to a wide range of users. From an application perspective, important questions arise, for which XAI may be crucial: Is the system biased? Has the problem been formulated correctly? Is the solution trustworthy and fair? The goal of XAI and related research is to develop methods to interrogate AI processes with the aim of answering these questions. This can support decision makers while also building trust in AI decision-support through more readily understandable explanations.

Nature-inspired optimisation techniques are also often black box in nature, and the attention of the explainability community has begun to consider explaining their operation too. Many of the processes that drive nature-inspired optimisers are stochastic and complex, presenting a barrier to understanding how solutions to a given optimisation problem have been generated. Explainable optimisation can address some of the above application-focused questions around bias, problem formulation, and trust, that also arise during the use of an optimiser. By providing mechanisms that enable a decision maker to interrogate an optimiser and answer these questions trust is built with the system. On the other hand, many approaches to XAI in machine learning are based on search algorithms that interrogate or refine the model to be explained, and have the potential to draw on the expertise of the EC community. Furthermore, many of the broader questions (such as what kinds of explanation are most appealing or useful to end users) are faced by XAI researchers in general.

Workshop papers must be submitted using the GECCO submission system. After login, the authors need to select the “Workshop Paper” submission form. In the form, the authors must select the workshop they are submitting to. To see a sample of the “Workshop Paper” submission form, go to GECCO’s submission system and select “Sample Submission Forms”. Submitted papers must not exceed 8 pages (excluding references) and are required to be in compliance with the GECCO 2024 Papers Submission Instructions. It is recommended to use the same templates as the papers submitted to the main tracks. Each paper submitted to this workshop will be rigorously reviewed in a double-blind review process. In other words, authors should not know who the reviewers of their work are and reviewers should not know who the authors are. To this end, the following information is very important: Submitted papers should be ANONYMIZED. This means that they should NOT contain any element that may reveal the identity of their authors. This includes author names, affiliations, and acknowledgments. Moreover, any references to any of the author’s own work should be made as if the work belonged to someone else. All accepted papers will be presented at the ECXAI workshop and appear in the GECCO 2024 Conference Companion Proceedings. By submitting a paper, the author(s) agree that, if their paper is accepted, they will: