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Objects, you can refer to as 古い with impunity. But I have never once heard a
person referred to as 古い, so for a long time I thought the word just _didn't
apply_ to people. Still, searching 古い男 on Google gets pictures of old men. I
imagine it's probably best to refer to old people as something like おじいさん or
老人 if their age is relevant, though.
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word-choice words politeness
Is it rude to refer to a person as 古い?
To us native speakers, 「古{ふる}い男{おとこ}」 _**does not**_ mean "an old man"; It
never does to tell the truth. This is why direct translation could be
dangerous at times.

「古い男」 to us generally means " _ **an old-fashioned man**_ ". In other words,
it is synonymous to 「古いタイプの男」、「価値観{かちかん}の古い男」、「考{かんが}え方{かた}の古い男」, etc.

Therefore, a 「古い男」 does not necessarily have to be biologically old because it
is his personal values that matter here.

To refer to "an old man", we use
「年配{ねんぱい}の男の人」、「老人{ろうじん}」、「年老{としお}いた男性{だんせい}」、「おじいさん」, etc. (We do not use 「男」
by itself nearly as often as you use "man" in English.)

Finally, it might help to remember that 「古い」 is the antonym of 「新{あたら}しい」
("new") and _**not**_ of 「若{わか}い」 ("young"). This is clearly different from
English where "old" is the antonym of both "new" and "young". It is a "well-
known" cause of mistranslation.
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> But I have never once heard a person referred to as 古い,

We use 古い also 新しい for a person not for describing his/her age but for
describing his/her way/tendency of thinking.

As you know 古い is an adjective, and an adjective has two different ways of use
as a predicative use and an attributive one.

An attributive use of 古い is already answered using the example with 古い男, so
I'll answer 古い in a predicative use.

古い in 彼は **古い** means 彼の **考え方は古い** _His way of thinking is obsolete/old-
fashioned_ , while 彼は新しい means _His way of thinking is
novel/original/innovative/unconventional/audaciou/avant-garde._

Both ways of use of 古い could be used, but I think 彼は古い/新しい is used more than
彼は古い男/新しい男です.

# EDIT

A good way to refer to "an old man" is **お年寄｛としよ｝り** like
（車内{しゃない}では、）お年寄りに席｛せき｝を譲｛ゆず｝る _to yield one's seat to an elderly person (on
the train)_.
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