In The Stranger by Camus, how is Meursault a stranger to himself, to society, and to his environment?

The
French title of Camus' work, called in most English translations, is
L'‰tranger. This has been variously translated as The Estranged
One, The Outsider, and The Foreigner. These
translations do have opposing nuances of meaning. The Stranger suggests
social isolation. The Foreigner suggests
cultural difference. The Outsider suggests the
personal behavior of an idiosyncratic person who acts in such a way
as to be set apart from others. The Estranged One suggests one who has had
a natural relationship severed.

You can see that
each option holds a different light to the main thematic element of the story. My personal
preference is for The Outsider as it relates to a person's behavior and its
results, which is what the novel is most about: How Meursault acts in an absurd world and the
consequences of his actions, this in a world where even the Sun behaves absurdly while at one
time being helpful and at another time being destructive.

With this said so
as to give a deeper perspective into Meursault as a character and Camus as a novelist, we'll
examine Meursault as a stranger. It is difficult to argue that he is a stranger to
himself since he is so keenly aware of every sensation he has and
so bitingly honest and direct about his desires and intentions and emotional feelings:

he asked me a last question: Did I regret what I had
done?
After thinking a bit, I said that what I felt was less regret than a kind of
vexationI couldnt find a better word for it.

Yet, it may
be said he is a stranger to himself if one takes the position that morality and emotional
empathy are innate qualities (something author William Golding contests). In this light, he is a
stranger to himself because he is isolated from his social obligations and moral duties, as was
demonstrated at the vigil for his mother.

It is easier to argue that he is a
stranger to society in that he does not hold with, believe in,
follow with society's traditions, rules, mores, or expectations. For example, he does not mourn
his losses since he doesn't feel them other than intellectually. He does not love with yearning,
which he reveals by explaining that he would agree to marry any girl he liked and who might ask
him:

I said I didnt mind; if she was keen on it, wed get
married. ... she asked me again if I loved her. I replied, ... I supposed I didnt. ... but, if
it would give her pleasure, we could get married right away. ...
Suppose another girl
had asked you to marry herI mean, a girl you liked in the same way as you like mewould you have
said €˜Yes to her, too?
Naturally.

Again, it
is harder to argue that he is a stranger to his environment since
it is his environment that he feels so keenly and that influences him so profoundly: "the
glare of the morning sun hit me in the eyes like a clenched fist." Yet it might be argued
that he is a stranger to his environment in that he has no way within his coping devices to
control or mitigate the raw effect of his environment upon himself. In other words, it might be
said that had he not been a stranger to his environment, he would have known and understood more
fully the impact the sun and heat and glare and hot wind had upon him and taken measures to
protect himself from his environment.

I was conscious only
of the cymbals of the sun clashing on my skull, ... scarring my eyelashes, and gouging into my
eyeballs. ... a fiery gust came from the sea, ... a great sheet of flame poured down through the
rift.