Returning towards the substantive topic: you die of certain lack of sleep, not of any lack of sleep - the mentioned acquaintance has not properly slept for years, and it was incidentally because of internal noise that he had to listen to instead of sleeping because it was too loud, and he survived, though not really happy about the fact.

That billions of people gladly live in cities, under constant background noise, does not prove that the constant specific noise from a wind turbine can be bearable in general or for individuals.

For your apparent position, you would have to argue that the said «filter» works for all noises. But mind you: you should also defend the position that it works so for people in general in all relevant situations (e.g. industrial noises at sleep time), and that such situation is a healthy situation, not just tolerated or simply unfelt.

Do not miss anyway the point about the location: wind turbines are not located in cities, the latter being entities that some avoid slightly less than strip malls... There is an issue when you or I or Jack live that moment in which "I have enough, I will fling off for today, purge time", and we go to the countryside and it's engines all around, go to the hills and it's dogs all around, go to the mountains and it's wind turbines all around, so we go to the caves because mass is soundproof and it is dark and damp and cold and the buzzing of insects... It's about preservation of properly liveable places.

And about your last statement specifically, "background noise [being or] not the same as pain": if your body-mind system fights it with an effort, if it bothers your conscience, background noise is the same as pain - otherwise, not even pain is the same as pain. So, it must depend on the specifics.